Boon Oude Geuze is the flagship beer of Brouwerij Boon. Frank Boon first began commercial geuze production in 1975 when he registered his business and began buying lambic to blend. Blending is a common practice where someone purchases brewed lambic from various breweries then creates their own unique blend. Seeing as geuze is a blend of lambics, this was a natural starting place for the enterprising young enthusiast. In 1978, he took over Rene De Vits’ Geuze blending business which gave him a line to a 300 year old brewery. 1990 saw the brewing of Boon’s first in house beers.
Frank Boon, arguably, can be congratulated for saving one of the world’s unique brewing traditions. He waded into a business that was seeing small breweries in Belgium closing at a very high rate. One of his family members who worked at the Artois Brewery predicted there would be no small breweries left in Belgium by the new millennium. Since this brave begininning, Frank Boon lobbied the European Unionto get GTS, “Guaranted Traditional Specialty,” status for lambics. If it contains the word “Oude” in the name of the beer, it’s been brewed using traditional methods and ingredients. Geuze may be one of my favorite styles of beer. For helping to save them, Frank Boon is truly one of my beer heroes. According to their website, this beer “(is) a magnificent blend of 90% mild 18 month-old lambic, 5% strong 3 year-old beer and 5% very young lambic.”
Appearance: Cloudy gold with amber-ish highlights and an off-white head and ok retention.
Aroma: Lemon zest, earthy funk with floral undertones. A touch of dried grass/straw.
Taste: Nicely sour with enough sweetness to moderate the tartness. Lemon and citrus with a nice level of earthy notes.
Overall Impression: This is a great Geuze to introduce people to the style. It’s the ideal, in my opinion, of what a Geuze should taste like. It’s not too agressively sour like Tilquin or Cantillon (which are amazing products in their own right but not as new person friendly.) Above all, this is a prime example of a geuze that is balanced, complex and beautiful. If you see it, snap it up.
Availability: In larger cities at top notch beer stores.
7% ABV
(Batch date January, 31 2011)
Funny. I had Hanssens Oude Gueuze tonight. Not as brutal as I was braced for. I think I might have even enjoyed it.
Hanssens is one of the few blenders that survived the 70′s. They do nice work. Not a sour fan?
I’m getting there. I may even be developing preferences. In fact, I loved De Proef Zoetzuur.
Great one again! Do you know the best before date? I usually age my beers (not all of them), Taste new and old ones and see a lot of differences. I have this one too and I can compare it to your notes and port it myself.
Cheers
I’ll take a look. I’m not really equipped to age my beers. Not enough climate controlled vertical space. Although Boon says you can age the bottle on its side for longer periods of time.
More important is a stable temperature, than cellar conditions. If you have both is obviously best. In a higher temeperature the ageing is only faster. Boon is great, the man ánd his beers I mean
Well, this is my fist summer in this house. I’ve seen about a 10F degree swing in temperature so far, at it’s max. Not horrible really, but we have a pretty mild climate.
10F is very reasonable. Up untill now only pauwel Kwak didn’t like to be aged, It didn’t go bad, but it didn’t get better either.
By the way, I created two new menu’s/widgets (places to peruse…) on my blog, to beer and wine. You guys are the first on it now! Cheers.
Thank you so much! I’ve just added you to mine as well. I appreciate it very much.
Thanx!
I put the batch date on the post. January 31 2011, I believe.
Lambics are worth the battle for your taste buds. I love Marriage Parfait. Now that is a beautiful beer.
I instantly loved sours from the first moment I tried one. If I remember correctly, it was even this beer. Marriage Parfait is my absolute favorite Boon product. I have an ’07 I’ll open soon.
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