Dunkelrot, fast schon braun ist dieses Bier. An Bier erinnert das Getränk allergins kaum, eher wie frisch gepresster Saft. Und sehr süß ist das Zeug auch. Schwer zu bewerten, schmecken tut es, aber wirklich Bier ist es nicht. Test vom 12.10.2005, Gebinde: Glasflasche Noten: 9,9,9,9,11,9 - 9,10

Best before 06/2004, bottle from Mr. Gueuze himself, Jacob Lovenlund. Sampled on 8/20/2005 with Eyedrinkale. Pours a respectable cloudy, heavily sedimented tangerine-to-deep lemon orange/yellow. Pretty bright and colorful for a gueuze. A thin film of white bubbles is coaxed from the bottle, lasting no more than a few minutes. Touch of lacing in streaks on the glass. Aroma has sharp, oily, leather tannins, dry and sour, with some grapefruit, lemons and sweet-like barnyard notes. I’m beginning to take these barnyard notes as sweet, though I know there’s no sugar in there, it has that leathery, robust sourness, which you can almost pass off as moderately sweet. Or maybe I just think too much about gueuze. Ahem, moving on, the flavor begins with a big shot of sour bacteria, followed up by a flavor that I can most closely approximate as a near flat mumosa with a touch of vanilla and tannins. Liquid begins to coat, leaving an old, tired bacterial flavor on the edges of the mouth, that struggles with sourness and is washed away in the end. Carbonation in the form of pretty big sized bubbles, nearly spent at this age (though it’s not that young). Certainly no sparkling lambic here. A tad bit heavy on the tongue, it is rather loose from the near flatness. But what saves it is the total lack of any "fake lambic" flavors in it. You arent going to mistake this stuff for Cantillon or 3F, but you also arent going to mistake it for one of the cheap imitation, sugary "lambics". Respectable, I will reiterate, with a good sour, lightly citric flavor, nice oily tannins and then a fairly short finish. At the end of the glass, after warming fully to room temp, I thought I began to notice some of the light powderiness that I hate in the fake lambics, but I quickly finished off my glass, and chalked it up to just my imagination! Thanks Jacob!

1987 bottle, courtesy of Joris Pattyn. Thanks, friend! Red brownish brick colour with no head. Lightly acid with flower perfume in nose. Smooth acid, with almost herbal qualities and light resinous illicit qualities, fungal. Smooth and blended, with perfect marriage of flavours. Wow!