Huge, very dense & fine off-white head over hazy orange-golden beer, very lively carbonated. Rubber, basketshoes, and then an explosion of horseblankte, immortelles, mushrooms, kari leaves, laurel. Sweetish (the alcohol working!), immortelles, horseblanket, again a wild mushroom flavour, oakleaves. Quantum level complexity. Hay and some faint leatherpolish in the aftertaste, together with some not really-sweet apples. Very good carbonation, slick, slight acidburn. Alcohol only revealed by the light sweetness. Arguably one of the most stellar gueuzes ever. Txs to Stef!

375ml bottle from Raynville Superstore. It pours clear golden with a thick, fluffy & lasting white head. The aroma is musty, natural yoghurt, granny smith apple, white grape, fizzy sherbet, gooseberry, soor plooms, oak, hay, grass, damp basement, mouldy lemon rind, cheese rind, deep funk and brett. The taste is crispy, bone dry, minerality, puckering, nip of acidity, lemony sherbet, dry white wine, gooseberry, plum, touch of cider vinegar, deep funk, damp oak, light tannin, hay, straw and some restrained alcohol presence. Finish is dry and funky. Medium body and moderate, lively carbonation. Nice depth of flavour and balance. Looking forward to trying a few of these with some age on them

Boon celebrates its fiftieth birthday this year, at least as a 'geuzestekerij' (the brewing of lambic only began in 1990), and does so in style, presenting this special version of his classic geuze Mariage Parfait - in itself one of the great icons in the geuze world. It represents a tradition taken over from De Vidts, the geuze blendery taken over by Frank Boon in the seventies: its operator already used the term 'mariage parfait' (perfect marriage) when referring to the finest barrels of lambic that he kept aside for blending a geuze exclusively for his sister's pub. It seems appropriate that for the fiftieth anniversary of one of the great driving forces behind the very survival of traditional lambic, Boon returned to one of his own great classics, and made it extra festive by 'beefing it up' to an ABV of 10% (especially when the original's 8% ABV is already way above average for the style). From a 37.5 cl geuze bottle with classy blue label - more brightly 'royal' blue than the dark blue used for the regular Mariage Parfait. Snow white, medium thick, slowly dissolving but 'ring-retaining' head - seemingly a bit less stable than average for a geuze, no doubt because of the alcohol content; misty deep orange-golden with amberish hue. Aroma of green gooseberries, bitter oranges, lots of old oak wood, lemon juice, wood sorrel, jute bags, sherry vinegar, old leather, dry soil, pond water, unripe plums, rosewater, hint of 'jenever'. Tart onset, lemony at the edges but not sharply acetic, estery with lots of redcurrant, gooseberry, sour grape, lime and unripe plum, minerally carbonated, lively, with full mouthfeel; bread-crusty core under drying yoghurty-lactic sourness and growing tannic woodiness, while the Brett effects nobly and elegantly manifest themselves as dry hay and old leather. Old hops provide a late and dim but important bitter effect as the acids continue to weave their web of full-on lambic complexity - and then there is of course the alcohol issue, indeed noticeable as a 'jenever'-ish effect at the back, warming yet not interfering with the beautiful lambic features. I generally dislike unusually strong lambics and have often taken Boon's classic Mariage Parfait at 8% as the upper limit of what is still capable of true lambic greatness at a higher ABV - and that same Boon manages to push the boundary for me, as from this one forward, I will accept that at even at 10%, geuze can still work properly and play its magic without being disturbed by too much alcohol... This one is still very close to the original Boon Geuze Mariage Parfait, it has the same flavour profile but in an amplified way, and still it manages to up the ante in a subtle kind of way. I think this testifies to the many decades of experience residing under Boon's roof - I could not have conceived a more worthy way of celebrating half a century of Boon. Majestic geuze.

Quite a fine carbonation. Very full bodied. Not citrusy or tangy. It's much more woody and has a deeper, sherry character. Very good.