Bottle 18/05/2024 Malmö May 2024 tasting at Palace Hall - sour fruity with lots of floral and herbal accents in play, light to medium body, delicate herbal and floral with elderflower into the finish.

Sako, originally a fairly unknown brewer of very local top-fermented beers, has been dabbling with lambic for several years now, and has since created a number of bottled lambics including flavoured 'geuzes' (which are technically not geuzes because of the flavourings) next to this 'plain' geuze, blended from their own lambics, with the help of living 'lambic legend' Willem Van Herreweghen - a name which instills faith and commands respect. From a 75 cl bottle with - very hard to remove - cork and muselet. Medium thick, egg-white, nicely moussey, quite firm and regular head over a hazy apricot blonde beer with dark-yellow glow and whirlwinds of sparkling raging throughout. Strong, fruity, appetising bouquet of green plum, unripe nectarine, lemon rind, dusty old wood, haystack, lightly toasted pumpkin seeds, apple peel, stewed rhubarb, white currants, unripe oranges, hints of halfripe strawberries, old bookshelves, near-ripe peaches, medium dry sherry, dried dandelion - and urine- to horseblanket-like Bretty funk coming up as the bottle is further emptied. Very fruity onset, high in esters even for a geuze but well-arranged, with a sharpish lime-like sourness sitting at the edges and briefly 'electrifying' the parotid glands at the first sip, then softening and unveiling other tart (green plum, gooseberry, unripe nectarine) but also sweetish (orange, pear, peach) fruit impressions, together forming a lovely blanket of colourful sourness mitigated by inherent sweetness, covering a vividly carbonated, mellow, bit 'fluffy' bready underbuilt through which lines of lemony and yoghurty-lactic sourness pierce. Tannic woody effects line the finish without becoming too strong or astringent and a mild old hop bitter accent lingers beyond, but vinosity, vivid fruitiness and brightly coloured, refreshing tartness remain the dominant factors till the last drop, overseen by retronasal urine-, barnyard- and goat stable-like Brettanomyces effects. Quite a funky one, but also very estery, with this bright and radiant fruitiness exploding in the mouth - mostly sour fruit, but also mellowing sweeter elements (mostly orange in the very end) hidden within, and further softened by bready yeast in suspension. Not the most magnificent geuze I had, but I had a few - and even if this orange- and peach-like sweet element could have been a bit more toned down for me personally (I prefer my lambics bone dry), it is clear that this one was made with confidence, knowledge and passion, resulting in a very fruity, juicy, colourful geuze with its own personality. Very well done for a company that appeared on this scene only relatively recently, but then of course, if you can count on Van Herreweghen for help...

Hazy blond colour, white foam. Herbal, a bit citrussy, light sweet. Good but a bit unbalanced.

20/IV/24 - 75cl bottle as a gift, shared @ home, BB: n/a, batch nr1, 2022 edition (2024-247) Thanks to Erwin and the GBV gang for the bottle!

GUSHER ALERT!
Cloudy orange blond beer, creamy of aery off-white head, unstable, falls down quickly. Aroma: fruity, juicy, nice, some tropical fruits, a little oxidized, fruity, nice, oranges. MF: lively carbon, medium body. Taste: bitter touch up front, nice gentle acidity, fruity, a bit oxidized, lemony, orange peel, dry, ok. Aftertaste: a bit oxidized, dry, bitter, nice acidity, juicy, lovely beer!

Shortlived off-white head over fully hazy, well-carbonated orange beer. Leather, horseblanket, dried flowers, immortelles, spicy. Sweeter horseblanket, floral, waterplants. Has a lot of restsugars. Straw, again immortelles, mushrooms. Certain slickness, too sticky for an Oude gueuze. Well-carbonated. It just doesn't tick all the boxes - surprising seen the magnificent Bascule Oude Geuze. Misses old lambic, IMHO.

Very clean for a new producer. Easy woody barrel notes, gentle funk. Smooth tartness. LCI

Doesn't taste like a proper geuze. Highly carbonated, spicy, slightly vinous funk from the wine barrels. Tastes like it's blended with a funky blonde ale.