Beers notes from Belgium and other European stops, July-August, 2003, for your reading pleasure.
Bier Circus (Brussels) Oh, what a place!! I am very grateful to the members of the alt.beer newsgroup who steered me here, and sent me to the Tim Webb beer guide to Belgium (and Holland and Luxembourg). Here we had: Postel Dubbel Bruin 7% draft (a very elegant beer, both to taste and to look at) Saison Dupont Biologique 5.5% draft (the only saison I saw during my brief stay in Belgium, and better than any of the saison knock-offs I have had at US brewpubs, which is saying something, as Pizza Port Solana Beach and the Santa Barbara Brewing Company both make goods ones) Guayasse blonde 6% draft (this was a great mouthful of a beer, very malty but balanced) Cantillon Foufone (sp?) apricot lambic 5% bottle (great, with the balanced sweetness and tartness of apricot perfectly going along with the typical sourness of the lambic; as a fruit-fancier as much as a beer-fancier, I appreciated the indication on the label that the variety of apricot used is Bergeron, which is not one I am familiar with)
Westvleteren abbey tap house
8 Bruin 8% (licorice, according to Webb's book, and I'm not going to argue)
12 Bruin 10.6% (rich burnt taste. Incredible!!) And they had their hop tarts available, which was the tastiest food item based on hops that I had on the trip, or ever (I also had—get this—plum and hop yogurt from a shop in Kew, England!).
Brugs Beertje, in Brugges It was getting late and we still had to drive back to Brussels (which proved to be quite an ordeal with traffic, road construction, and getting lost due to the necessary detours and the poor road signage on the outskirts of Brussels). Suffice it to say that I wish we could have spend the night in Brugges. I just might have stayed till closing. This place is described in the Tim Webb guide as one of the few beer bars you absolutely must visit at least once before you die, and he is right. Great list, and pleasant interior, and it attracts serious beer explorers (of course, most of them have taken Webb's advice). De Dolle Oerbier bottle (a "black" beer, but not really very black; I would not call it disappointing, but it was not exciting) Cuvée des Trolles blonde 7% tap (nice, malty, but no Guayasse) (I must be jaded already, after less than 30 hours in Belgium, because these were in fact, both GREAT beers.)
On the trip to Wesvleteren and Brugges, we also stopped in Ieper (excellent WWI museum, but the café suggested by the Webb guide was closed) and Poperinge (fascinating National Hop Museum, and locally brewed Hoegaarden and Poperings Hommelbier (wow) on tap at a beer café there).
On the next day, we started off with another frustrating drive out of central Brussels to see the Museum of Central Africa, which I had only wanted to visit since I was in high school. Despite the difficulty of getting around, the museum was well worth it. Then we dropped off the car (hurrah!) and returned to public transport and headed to the Anderlecht district of Brussels. There you will find the Cantillon lambic brewery. Wow, I had read about the cobwebds and dust, which they do not dare clean because (1) the cobwebs keep the insects under control, and (2) they do not want to upset the delicate spontaneous fermentation, which takes place in open vats. You get to see the vats (empty, as they have to brew in cool weather) and you walk through this dark hallway with wood cask upon wood cask of aging lambic. I wish I could have bottled the aroma in this hall! At the end you get to taste their (bottled) Kriek and Gueuze, both of which are perfection in a glass.
‘t Spinnekopke (Brussels) Cantillon draft Faro (dark brown, very sweet, but balanced; I liked it immediately, though I sure could not drink it all the time) Dubuisson Bush Ambrée 12% bottle (tasted like liquid caramel, beautifully balanced, almost as good as the draft Wesvleteren 12) The food here (cuisine a la biere) is incredible, too. We had salmon in witbier sauce and rabbit in gueuze.
Mort Subite Neat interior, really a throwback kind of place Grimbergen Double Brune draft (not exciting, but I am clearly getting jaded by all this great beer)
Bier Circus (again) La Binchoise blonde bottle (has orange peel, which really enhances this beer, because what lies beneath it is superbly balanced, and the orange peel is just there, but does not jump out at you) Zatte Bie bottle (a black beer, and it really is almost black; really rich and one of my favorites of the trip, which is saying something)
OK, I thought I was not going to get to Beersel, a suburb about 8 km southwest from the center of Brussels that I really hoped to visit, but we were running out of time and had to get to Bier Curcus again on our "last" night before getting up early to catch the flight home. But a funny thing happened on our way home. Our flight got cancelled. We were given the choice of getting out later the same day by train to Paris and then overnighting in Los Angeles (after a stop in Cincinnati) before getting a puddle-jumper to San Diego the next day, or staying another night in Brussels before getting a one-connection flight straight to SD the following day. Life is full of tough choices. This was not one of them.
No trains go to Beersel on Saturday and we failed to locate any bus information at Brussels Midi, despite being told by rail personnel that there were buses between the Gare du Midi and Beersel (one of our many non-beer frustrations with Brusselois institutional inefficiency, but I won't dwell on that), we decided to splurge on a cab. About $40 each way. But hey, the hotel was free and Bier Circus is closed on weekends. Wow, were we glad we went! And, again, thanks to the alt.beer folks for this tip.
In Beersel is the Drie Fonteinen (3 Fountains) brewery and lambic café. Kriekenlambic draft (very dry yet with sweet flavors from them the fruit that do not all overpower this beer, a superbly crafted lambic!) Gueze draft (my first taste of this style that is often claimed to be an acquired taste; I acquired it at the first sip! Rather spritzy and very refreshing. I can't describe all the flavors running around in this beer, but they are incredible. It is one of the richest and most complex taste experiences I have had, and the mouthfeel from the thick head is great, too, and the color is so appealing. What more can I say? Well, I can say that after drinking over half of it, I finally recognized part of the flavor profile as pitanga—any fruitheads out there know what a pitanga is?) Lambic draft (nice, in fact, great, but my least favorite of the beers tasted here, and that's only because everything else was incredible) Dec. 1997 vintage Gueze bottled (this was so much smoother than the current draft version; not necessarily better, just different, more subtle, and without the noticeable pitanga taste and with less spritz; when it arrived in the 75 cl bottle and after all those other glasses, I was sure we could not finish it. I should not have doubted myself.) The food here is also remarkable. More beer cuisine. We had turkey in white cheese with chicory and gueuze, and salmon in Payottenland cheese, also with chicory and gueuze. If in Brussels, DO NOT MISS THIS PLACE, even if it costs you 80 dollars to get there and back. It is utterly worth it.
I started with Belgium, even though it was our last stop because, beerwise, this was the highlight of the trip. But the trip included stops in Oslo and Bergen, Norway, and Paris and London. Here are some reports on those stops.
Paris I had never had the French style, Biere de Garde, before. Now I have, and I like it!
Taverne St. Germain No Biere de Garde on tap, but several in 75 cl bottles. La Choulette Blonde (7.5%). My immediate thought was "this tastes like I wish Champagne tasted." It really is quite Champagne-like. Really good. Also had a (Belgian) Carlus Triple here, which is really nice. And I am glad I did, because I never got around to having a triple in Belgium. They had other French styles that I did not recognize, but there are only so many 75 cl bottles than I can handle in one night, so I had to pass.
General Lafayette St. Sylvestre 3 Monts blonde 8.5% (75 cl bottle). Proved to be well worth 10.8 Euros (!). It's fruity, with a rich creamy finish. Slight hint of vanilla or maple, perhaps. (Took me a while to come to this tentative conclusion.) Then the finish comes and brings back to you a subtle bitterness, never overpowering the fruity malts. Excellent! Jenlain ambrée draft. Maybe a taste of figs. Whatever, it is very rich and satisfying.
Oslo
Norway may not be known for its beer culture, but there are some very fine beers brewed there. First of all, there is the Oslo Microbrewery, conveniently located just around the corner from our hotel. Good example of a steam beer, pretty good porter, and really nice stout. But the real highlight of beer-drinking in Oslo is the Lorry's pub on Parkveien. It has an excellent array of Norwegian lagers (as well as other lagers and ales, both tap and bottle). Ordinary Ringnes pilsner on tap, which you can find practically everywhere, but also on tap here is the Ringnes Extra, which is a very rich and enjoyable strong lager (a pale bock?). Everything else is bottled, but aside from the Aass bock, I had never seen any of them in the US. I especially liked the bock and the Bayersk (apparently that means Bavarian and refers to a Munich dunkles style) from Frydenlund. Hansa also had good examples of the style. These are all very malty. I was feeling a bit hop-deprived in Norway, but nonetheless I was enjoying the good malty strong brews. Oh, and Lorry has good food, in particular the reindeer patties in cream sauce with lingonberries (and sprigs of thyme grown in pots right at the bar). I have no idea if Norwegians ever eat something like this, but the ingredients sure were Norwegian. Really good.
I stuck my head into the Studenten Café, in central Oslo, which Michael Jackson reports as a "German-accented brewpub." But I did not see evidence of their having any house-brewed beers.
Bergen
Unfortunately, we could not located the Hansa juniper beer on our short stay. Only new beer added to the list was the Hansa pilsner, which I felt ran rings around the Ringnes.
London
Too short a trip, but I've been there several times recently, so OK. Of course, we went to the White Horse in Fulham. Best thing there this time was a Rooster Yankee summer ale (cask), which is quite hoppy. Also had Harvey's Best Bitter (cask).
The next day, after a quick tour of the Kew Gardens and Kew Bridge Steam Museum (both highly enjoyable, though the planes flying overhead out of nearby Heathrow come close to spoiling the botanical garden experience), we sought out The Hoop and Grape. According to the Real Ale Guide (2002) it might have Timothy Taylor Landlord (my favorite English bitter) and/or Brakspeare bitter (my second favorite) or Charles Wells Bombardier (which I wanted to try for the first time). Well, it had none of these, because it is closed. As in out of business, at least for now.
We went over to the Head of Steam, at Euston Station. Uninspiring exterior, but nice two-level interior with lots of railroad memorabilia on the walls and ceiling. I refused to get my hopes up about Black Sheep, which the Real Ale Guide says is sometimes on offer. But they did have Hop Back Summer Lightning, which I really enjoyed. Most of the other casks were empty or dispensing less-than-interesting ales, so time to move on.
Next stop was the Lamb and Flag, which I remembered fondly as the first pub I visited on the first of my recent set of visits to London. I had the Adnan's Bitter (boring) and finally had the Bombardier (really complex, especially at the finish; Michael Jackson describes it as sulfury, but I could not detect that, but whatever, it was unusual and appealing).
We capped the night at the Anglesea Arms, in Kensington, one of my favorite pubs in London. This has previously had Brakspeare, but no more. The next day, on the flight to Oslo, I read an article in either the Times or the Guardian that implied that this brewery is defunct, which would be a shame if true. So I settled for Adnan's Broadside (very dry, sort of fruity; hoppy, but not very bitter), and Fuller's ESB (which I somehow had forgotten was such a great beer), both on cask.