Dark reddish amber colour, white foam. Nose of red wine, lactic sourness, woody, yoghurt, red wine. Taste is tart, some light bitterness, complex for this ABV.

Heilig Hart’s driving force Hans Dusselier told me years ago that he was planning to create a range of sour ales using different fermentation, ageing and blending techniques – and the man kept his promise, as after the (successful) first attempt called Epiclese, he has now released three more sour ales, including this Custodia. It conveniently comes from a smaller bottle than Epiclese and is a blend of two batches of a sour ale (soured with Greek yoghurt, so Lactobacillus), one half aged on wine barrels for sixteen months and the other on clay amphoras for three months. The latter is very unusual in modern drinking culture, though the Georgians still apply it to wine (qvevri) like they have done for – literally – millennia; I can think of only one other Belgian brewery that has experimented with it and that is of course Cantillon, the famous lambic brewery in Anderlecht, never shying away from an experiment. This Custodia forms an egg-white, moussy, irregular, quickly diminishing and eventually completely dissolving head on a hazy deep amber coloured robe with somewhat brownish tinge which likely hints at oxidation due to the ageing process. Aroma surprisingly ‘Bretty’ (more likely to come from the wine barrels than from the amphoras I suspect), the classic ‘horseblanket’, armpit sweat, old ruks, sourdough, persimmon, wet leather, dried sage, old cotton cloth or indeed something very particularly clay-like from the amphoras, dusty herbes de Provençe. Fruity onset, gooseberry and wild apple sourness with a slight lemony edge but mitigated by a soft sweetish medlar-like core as well, medium carbonation with minerally aspects in this case also coming from the amphora part, supple bready maltiness, old-biscuity and dry-peanutty, with that leathery and hayish funkiness returning, paired with a creamy yoghurty lactic sourness which adds a refreshing touch to an otherwise dry, ‘rustic’ beer. Tannic woody effects play in the background, adding to the overall dryness and ‘oldness’ this beer exhibits. More ‘noble’ and rustic and definitely less supple and fruity than Epiclese, as if this one represents old lambic and Epiclese was the young lambic – even if it is not lambic, of course. Complex, elegant, deeply flavoured even in spite of its modest ABV and unexpectedly Bretty: a very interesting experiment that will no doubt still change a lot with further ageing. I wonder why this project does not draw more attention from craft beer geeks – but perhaps it is for the better that for the time being, they are operating relatively quietly, we do not need another hype ‘à la’ Antidoot or Bofkont as far as I am concerned, making it so damn difficult for passionate sour ale lovers like myself to obtain bottles...

Bottle from the brewery. Dark brown/reddish colour, creamy beige foam. Soft carbonation. Complex nose of wood, red wine, fruitiness. Not very outspoken but still complex. Taste is light tart, dry, sourish. Very subtle but well balanced.

14/V/21 - 37.5cl bottle as a gift, shared @ home, BB: I/2026, L 2021-02, 5281 bottles (2021-393) Thanks to Erwin for the bottle!

Little cloudy orange to dark amber beer, big creamy to aery irregular head, unstable, non adhesive. Aroma: very funky, lots of brett, some caramel, malty, little metallic, more brett, touch of vinegar. MF: ok carbon, medium body. Taste: pretty sour start, lemony, soft bitterness, hint of vinegar, wood notes, lemon peel, citric acidity, bit earthy, citrus notes, Aftertaste: dry, soft bitterness, earthy, slightly metallic, fruity notes, some peaches, citric acid, some grapefruit.

The first beer in what is intended to constitute a new trilogy in the Heilig Hart church brewery's saga, In de Naam van de Heilige Geest, being the follow-up to the original trilogy entitled In de Naam van de Vader which contains technically correct, but style-wise rather straightforward beers. I have been looking forward to this new trilogy's 'firstling' for a long time: I first met the brewer, who is also an expert (and dealer) in natural wine and sake, during a visit to the Alvinne brewery in Moen on a beautiful summer day three and a half years ago from now and he already told me back then that he had plans to create beers in three trilogies, each time making use of different fermentation techniques. I therefore not only expect two more 'wine-beers' to appear later on in this series, but a totally different new series as well, which I imagine will take several more years to avail. Anyway: this Epiclese is intended as a hybrid of wine and beer, made with wine must of Gamay grapes (which I coincidentally encountered recently in a few grape beers by Atrium as well) that was blended with a wheat beer wort, fermented with the yeasts naturally present on the grape skins and aged partially on ceramic egg fermenters (the direct descendent of the original stone fermenters used in Antiquity - and still today in the Caucasus country of Georgia, the so-called 'qvevri') and partially on a wooden barrel. The result shows a thin but (at least initially) stable, tiny-bubbled, somewhat beige-tinged off-white head with some small patches off the edge, on a deep and warm orange amber-glowing robe with cognac tinge, beautifully and equally misty, through which disparate, fine gas bubbles quietly travel upwards. Rich, fruity bouquet of indeed wine must - with a sour cherry and red raspberry juice quality to it that seems to typify Gamay wine, fermenting pears or red apples, oxidized rosé champagne, old dried orange peel, maracujá, baked clay (the egg fermenters clearly - and even quite strong here, as in some of these experimental Cantillon lambics aged in amforas, though a bit more subtle), home-baked 'pistolets' coming fresh from a hot oven, a gently earthy tone of fried sweet potato, roses, cava, overripe gooseberries, oloroso and soaking wet oak wood, vague hints of honey, dried plantain leaves, melon, fried tomato peel and very faint smoky phenols flirting with the flavour threshold but adding some extra complexity faraway in the background. Utterly fruity, juicy onset, immediately crisply lemony-sour, as in fresh redcurrant or other sour berries, though the acidity becomes a bit softer towards the end - all the while behaving elegantly and acquiring a more yoghurty, lactic character as it develops; hidden within this tartness are sweet ripe grapes, impressions of apple, red plum, vague passionfruit and not completely ripe cantaloupe; carbonation is inherently spritzy but in a very refined and 'quiet', almost Lambrusco-like way, paired with a smooth, vinous body that nevertheless feels quite 'full' for 6.5% ABV. The middle phase is, indeed and as promised, a combination of smooth wheat and barley breadiness with juicy wine 'mustiness', continuing the play of sour and sweet fruit into a rich, appetizing finish where that baked clay-like minerality of the ceramic fermenters meets the fruitiness of the yeasts and blends with them into a brief and volatile effect of sweet tomato, quickly eclipsed by sweet-sour, colourful 'grapeyness' and switching to a tannic astringency from barrels and grapes. Dry finish with a more 'beery' shade (possibly from the hops, even if these are merely structural and do not provide any bitterness), but everything is tied together perfectly, this juicy fruitiness - the 'core' of this beer - remains lively and satisfying and each sip makes me want to take another one. Highly elegant creation, inspired by the Italian wine-beer hybrids which I think are among the most innovative results of European craft brewing of the past decades; a perfect bière d'apéritif and highly promising for the second and third episodes in this new trilogy... --- Beer aliased from original tick of in de Naam van de Heilige Geest Epiclese on 02 Jan 2021 at 23:10 - Score: Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 9 | Flavor - 8.5 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 9. Original review text: The first beer in what I assume is intended to form a new trilogy, "In de Naam van de Heilige Geest", in the Heilig Hart church brewery's saga, the follow-up to the "original trilogy" entitled "In de Naam van de Vader" which contains technically correct, but style-wise rather straightforward beers. I have been looking forward to this new trilogy's 'firstling' for a long time: I first met the brewer, who is also an expert (and dealer) in natural wine and sake, during a visit to the Alvinne brewery in Moen on a beautiful summer day five years ago and he already told me back then that he had plans to create beers in three trilogies, each time making use of different fermentation techniques. I therefore not only expect two more 'wine-beers' to appear later on in this series, but a totally different new series as well, which I imagine will take several more years to avail. Anyway: this Epiclese is intended as a hybrid of wine and beer, made with wine must of Gamay grapes (which I coincidentally encountered recently in a few grape beers by Atrium as well) that was blended with a wheat beer wort, fermented with the yeasts naturally present on the grape skins and aged partially on ceramic egg fermenters (a revivalist interpretation of the clay fermenting vessels originally used in wine making millennia ago) and partially on a wooden barrel. The result shows a thin but (at least initially) stable, tiny-bubbled, somewhat beige-tinged off-white head with some small patches off the edge, on a deep and warm orange amber-glowing robe with cognac tinge, beautifully and equally misty, through which disparate, fine gas bubbles quietly travel upwards. Rich, fruity bouquet of indeed wine must - with a sour cherry and red raspberry juice quality to it that seems to typify Gamay wine, fermenting pears or red apples, oxidized rosé champagne, old dried orange peel, maracujá, baked clay (the egg fermenters clearly - and even quite strong here, as in some of these experimental Cantillon lambics aged in stone amforas, though a bit more subtle), home-baked 'pistolets' coming fresh from a hot oven, a gently earthy tone of fried sweet potato, roses, overripe gooseberries, oloroso and wet oak wood, vague hints of honey, dried plantain leaves, melon, fried tomato peel and very faint smoky phenols flirting with the flavour threshold but adding some extra complexity faraway in the background. Utterly fruity, juicy onset, immediately crisply sour, as in fresh redcurrant or other sour berries, though the acidity becomes a bit softer towards the end - all the while behaving elegantly and acquiring a more yoghurty, lactic character as it develops; hidden within this tartness are sweet ripe grapes, impressions of apple, red plum, vague passionfruit and not completely ripe cantaloupe; carbonation is inherently spritzy but in a very refined and 'quiet', almost Lambrusco-like way, paired with a smooth, vinous body that nevertheless feels quite 'full' for 6.5% ABV. The middle phase is, indeed and as promised, a combination of smooth wheat and barley breadiness with juicy wine 'mustiness', continuing the play of sour and sweet fruit into a rich, appetizing finish where that baked clay-like minerality of the ceramic fermenters meets the fruitiness of the yeasts and blends with them into a brief and volatile effect of sweet tomato, quickly eclipsed by sweet-sour, colourful 'grapeyness' and switching to a tannic astringency from barrels and grapes. Dry finish with a more 'beery' shade (possibly from the hops, even if these are merely structural and do not provide any bitterness), but everything is tied together perfectly, this juicy fruitiness - the 'core' of this beer - remains lively and satisfying and each sip makes me want to take another one. Highly elegant creation, inspired by the Italian wine-beer hybrids which I think are among the most innovative results of European craft brewing of the past decades; a perfect "bière d'apéritif" and highly promising for the second and third episodes in this new trilogy...