750mL bottle at Moeder Lambic Fontainas, pours a clear bright golden with a small white head. Nose has signature barnyard funk, light citrus, and a touch of leather. Flavour has a wonderful barnyard funk upfront, with light leather, bitter citrus zest, and a touch of champagne-like effervescence. Really nice funk as always. Excellent.

750mL bottle at Moeder Lambic Fonteinas. Pours clear gold with a white head. Rustic, funky nose. Flavour is very rustic, lots of funk, a bit woody, fairly acidic. Great geuze.

Five family members of Pierre Tilquin's pedigree had already been honoured with their own 'Cuvée' so far, distinguished by the proportions of young and old lambic, and now three new ones have been released - with this one consisting of 20% one year old lambic, 50% two year old lambic and 30% three year old lambic, and honouring Mr. Tilquin's great-grandmother Denise. Medium thick, crackling, egg-white, uneven-bubbled, slowly receding head (eventually just a thin ring) over a misty, warm apricot blonde robe with old-golden glow and uniform, steady sparkling interspersed with larger bubbles shooting upwards from the bottom of the glass every few seconds. Classic geuze aroma of dried bitter orange peel, old wood, unripe green plum, old peach kernels, barnyard, gooseberry, haystacks, even a faint whiff of dry manure, dried garden weeds, grated Gran Padano, wet blue limestone, vague (sour) apple peel and damp earth. Spritzy, crisp onset, dryish but with vivid lambic-ester fruitiness to entertain, ranging between unripe plums in spring through dried lemon flesh and wry green apple, with a prominent minerality throughout, somewhat limestone-like, coming from very fine-bubbled, yet very active carbonation. Rounded mouthfeel, a dry bread-crusty core further dried by lactic sourness and ongoing dried sour fruit tartness, the overall dryness reinforced by strong tannic woodiness - but still, deep below, a very faint peachy sweetishness lurks, vitally important to the overall structure in spite of its subtlety, like a pinch of salt in a dessert. Retronasal funk reminiscent of old cracked leather, old hard cheese rind and a touch of 'Bretty' urine shows up too, completing the picture of a well-developed, rich and complex geuze; a deep but persistent, eventually even quite outspoken, dandelion-like 'old hop' bitterness lingers on the root of the tongue, along with all that woodiness, dried sour fruit impressions and continuing minerality, all of which remain in perfect balance with one another. Dry, tannic and noble geuze with lightly musty and earthy edges to it, but never losing its elegance; perhaps the carbonation could have been a tad livelier and (thus) the head a bit more stable, but this is really nitpicking because I cannot find anything else to deprecate... Well, here we are again: every single one of these Tilquin 'family cuvées' has been a masterpiece in the art of geuze blending so far, and this one is no different. With two more to follow (already on the market now), honouring Renée and Marguerite, I am confident to say that I have at least two more geuze masterpieces waiting to be explored after this one. An ambitious and original project, carried out with tangible love and respect.