They say…
Best beer and travel writing award 2015, 2011 -- British Guild of Beer Writers Awards
Accredited Beer Sommelier
Writer of "Probably the best book about beer in London" - Londonist
"A necessity if you're a beer geek travelling to London town" - Beer Advocate
"A joy to read" - Roger Protz
"Very authoritative" - Tim Webb.
"One of the top beer writers in the UK" - Mark Dredge.
"A beer guru" - Popbitch.
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Cantillon Iris
ABV: 5% Origin: Anderlecht, Brussel Website: www.cantillon.be Date: 18 September 2000
Another review from the archive written for the pioneering Oxford Bottled Beer Database (OBBD). I’ve left it uncorrected — so please read it in that historical spirit. Iris has since become a relatively regular part of Cantillon’s range: it’s very highly […]
“Anything but history, for history must be false.” Robert Walpole (1676-1745)
Old mash tun — though probably not 200 years old — at Lindemans, Vlezenbeek.
Beer culture is a form of popular culture, and suffers similarly from a less than scrupulous approach to its history. Authoritative histories of high art, politics, […]
Gueuzerie Tilquin
There are few circles of brewing so exclusive that most serious beer enthusiasts could recite their membership from memory. One is the roll call of Trappist breweries, currently seven strong (though shortly to increase to nine). Another, slightly longer, is the list of artisanal lambic producers in and around Brussels, the […]
Gueuzerie Tilquin
ABV: 4% Origin: Lembeek, Vlaams-Brabant, Vlaanderen Website: www.gueuzerietilquin.be, www.boon.be
Wooden former wine barrels at Gueuzerie Tilquin
Meerts is something of a forgotten member of the lambic family, though a couple of centuries ago it was ubiquitous in the historic brewing region. It’s the spontaneously fermented equivalent of small beer, made with […]
Gueuzerie Tilquin
ABV: 5% Origin: Vlezenbeek, Vlaams-Brabant, Vlaanderen Website: www.gueuzerietilquin.be, www.lindemans.be
Brewhouse at Lindemans, Vlezenbeek
The Lindeman family began brewing lambic as a sideline on their cereal farm at Vlezenbeek, just outside Brussels, in 1809, and only finally gave up farming to concentrate on beer in 1950. In the 1980s the brewery achieved […]
Great British Beer Festival 2011
ABV: 6% Origin: Lembeek, Vlaams-Brabant, Vlaanderen (matured in Roma, Italy)
Revelation Cat Craft Brewing
Rome-based gyspy brewer Alex Liberati has been doing some strange stuff with unblended lambics from Boon and Girardin over the past few years. I wasn’t convinced by his single hop dry hopped lambics — […]
Banner for the Toer de Geuze 2011 on display at 3 Fonteinen.
Snobbery aside, there are some potentially defensible grounds on which to build a case that making wine is a higher field of human endeavour than making beer. Winemakers squeeze the maximum complexity and variety from the minimum of means. From New […]
Toer de Geuze 2011, Top Tastings 2011
ABV: 6% Origin: Lembeek, Vlaams-Brabant, Vlaanderen Website: www.boon.be
Traditional lambic crocks and samples at Boon, Lembeek
On very rare occasions I taste a beer that’s so extraordinary it sends my rating system off the scale, and this, sampled direct from one of the gigantic oak […]
Toer de Geuze 2011
ABV: 5% Origin: Gooik, Vlaams-Brabant, Vlaanderen Website: www.decam.be
De Cam brewery and museum, Gooik
De Cam is a blender rather than a brewery, buying in lambics from Boom, Girardin and Lindemans, so I’ve no idea where this beer was actually brewed, but it was matured for at least one […]
Toer de Geuze 2011
ABV: 5.7% Origin: Lembeek/Beersel, Vlaams-Brabant, Vlaanderen Website: www.oudbeersel.com
Appropriately decorated window at Oud Beersel, Beersel
Brewed at Boon in Lembeek to former Vandervelden brewery recipes, the Oud Beersel lambics are tanked to Beersel to undergo maturation and blending. I assume this one, served from a bag in a box […]
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Cask This pioneering new book explains what makes cask beer so special, and explores its past, present and future. Order now from CAMRA Books. Read more here.
London’s Best Beer The fully updated 3rd edition of my essential award-winning guide to London’s vibrant beer scene is available now from CAMRA Books. Read more here.
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