The Little Beer Corporation
Licher Bier
Oktoberfest Beer
"It tastes very German!"..."I like German beer". A lot less hoppy than these heavy PACNW beers. "A little backwards from our beers here" $5 / 90pts — 12 years ago
Johanna Jensen Roberts
Albariño 2012
Johanna Jensen Roberts 2012 Albariño. A little effervescent, a little beer-like, a bit like Kombucha, nourishing and healthy-seeming, refreshing, just needs a label to be perfect. Slap a label on this and share it Johanna! — 12 years ago
Crabbie's
Original Ginger Beer
A little too sweet and not as hot as I'd like but nice. — 12 years ago
Rootstock Cellars
Cheeseburger Red
Big kudos here, to the vintners, for providing just a little spice on the nose introducing flavors that present smoothly right after pulling the cork and results in big ole mouthful of jammy red fruit covering the entire palate with proper tannins and an easy finish resonating trails of what started as it drifts down one's throat. I found this, very affordable, yet right-on red wine at Promise Land Market (top-notch craft beer and wine bar that has become my fall hang while back home in Morehead City, NC; checkout the superb yet casual charcuterie). All a delight! (especially the people; come and see...) — 12 years ago
Prairie Artisan Ales
Prairie Hop Ale
A little sweet but a very tasty bright beer. — 12 years ago
Brouwerij De Molen
Kopi Loewak Imperial Stout
Very rich dark beer. Thick soft head with a little bitter. Kind of wish I cellared it but a really nice beverage. — 12 years ago
Hidden Legend Winery
Pure Honey Mead
Another flavorful Mead of the lesser sweet variant. I rate this on the same level of greatness as the SkyRiver Mead, although this one is a little bit more dry. It gives it an almost beer like property, though it's still rich and smooth like a wine should be. — 12 years ago
Cantillon Brewery
Zwanze Tripel 2013
Jean Van Roy's amazing story of Zwanze 2013. When we started renovation works in the cellars of the brewery two years ago, much to our surprise we came upon the remains of some very old walls. In agreement with the medievalists of the city of Brussels, the works were stopped in order to allow archaeological excavations to take place.
Shortly thereafter we were astonished to find out that Cantillon brewery had in fact been built on the ruins of the very ancient Abbey of Cureghem! According to the medievalists, this religious community was well-known during the middle ages for its fowl fed on draff and, more specifically, for its dish of stuffed Cureghem capon, which was served with a beer brewed at the abbey and apparently drew pilgrims from all over Europe.
Yet it was truly a heavenly surprise when the excavations uncovered the cell of the abbot, Father Faro. In the small room the archaeologists found quite a few old reference books, one of which contained the original recipes for the beers brewed at the abbey several hundred years ago. We didn’t hesitate for a second and decided on the spot to recreate one of these mythical beers.
This beer, which will be our Zwanze for 2013, therefore bears the name of its illustrious place of origin, Abbaye de Cureghem (Cureghem Abbey). Cureghem was formerly a village established many centuries ago on the banks of the Senne, the river running through present-day Brussels. The area was very heavily industrialised during the 19th century and, among other things, became home to many breweries. Today, it is part of the municipality of Anderlecht.
Since beers commonly referred to as “abbey beers” are not, or not any longer, products of spontaneous fermentation, we decided to brew a top fermentation beer, from a technical point of view in any case. The yeasts were selected in collaboration with Institut Meurice, a post-secondary college in Brussels specialising in biotechnology. Brewed in March 2012, our “Cureghem” beer fermented four weeks in stainless steel tanks before being blended with 10% lambic and pumped into 400-litre barrels of various origins. After maturing for six months, the beers were blended and put into casks or bottles to undergo re-fermentation and reach 7.2% ABV (Alcohol by Volume).
Inevitably, a top fermentation beer brewed in a spontaneous fermentation environment will be affected by the wild yeasts in the air, and this is certainly what happened in our case. For our Cureghem, the cultured yeasts were clearly the main factor behind primary fermentation and I think that the wild yeasts in the beer will instead play an increasingly important role as the product ages. However, despite the addition of the lambic to give it a little “extra something” in terms of character and ageing characteristics, this Zwanze cannot in any case be considered a spontaneous fermentation beer.
The long fermentation period coupled with the presence of wild yeasts lends this beer a solid character with a dry finish that lingers on the palate, while the combined use of fresh and aged hops yields both freshness and bitterness. Moreover, the different malts used give this year’s Zwanze a coppery colour along with a touch of caramel and candied fruit that provide body. Clearly, this is not your standard “abbey” beer but, perhaps, it is representative of what these beers were one or two hundred years ago — 12 years ago
Allison Orr
It's a cider beer night and grass hoppah is my favorite little hints of lemongrass this cider is crisp, fresh and not overly sweet — 11 years ago