A drop of the black stuff

I laughed when I saw that Grand Cru Beers had put a stock of Oude Geuze Boon Black Label on the shelf in my local SuperValu. Every week, doing the grocery shopping, I'd pass by it and think "Haha, I mean who's going to buy that in Dublin 12? For €11 a bottle?" It took a couple of months to realise that it was me.

There's a whiff of the US about its English-language label and imperial units. I guess it's intended more for there than Sundrive Road. There's also the claim to be "the driest geuze we make", because those Americans love a superlative. I did precede it with a standard Oude Geuze Boon, for calibration. Any excuse, really. And yes, while the basic one has a lovely stonefruit juiciness, that's missing from this. Instead there's a mouth-puckering edge and a hit of bricky nitre. It's not overdone, however, keeping everything very classy and classic. There's a real invigorating quality, helped by the busy palate-scrubbing fizz.

While highly enjoyable, I do think some of the complexity is missing compared to the standard. It's less rounded, going all-out for big sour. Just as well the Boon blending skill kicks in and insists on still making a superb, properly balanced, geuze. €11 well spent.

With a taste for geuze in my mouth I decided to open the freebie bottle I picked up at the Mort Subite brewery back in May. They've called it Bubbles from Brussels, which is slightly odd as Mort Subite isn't in Brussels: the nearest large town is called Asse. Maybe a rebrand is in order.

I wasn't expecting much from it, but it's not half bad. Not first-tier geueze by any stretch, but neither is it an oversweetened nerve-jangler. Instead it's right in the middle ground: tangy and earthy without going for full-on wince-inducing sourness. There's a waxy bitterness, some citrus peel, and a mild gunpowder spice: the core elements of really good geuze, but dialled back, as though the brewers weren't sure if people would like them. The biggest surprise is that this light-touch lambic is a whopping 7% ABV. It really doesn't taste it. Much like the Mort Subite tour itself, it's far from unmissable but not bad for free.

It must be nearly time to go to Belgium again.

Beer hunting with my mate

Darkness had fallen rapidly some time earlier but the insane traffic and hordes of people showed no sign of abating. We had been circling the busy square, with its mad tangle of flyovers and irrelevant traffic control measures, for about forty-five minutes, having spent the previous hour walking up here over thronged pavements and crossing some of the most dangerous junctions I've ever encountered. My only guide was a small scrap of paper where I'd scribbled an address. But Cairo doesn't really do addresses, which is why it took so long for me to finally admit that the brewpub just off Ramses Square didn't exist.

I turned to her and said "We passed a hotel just down that way. Fancy a pint?"

It wasn't until much later that I realised how lucky I am, from a beer-and-travel point of view, to have married the woman I did. Which is why I'm nominating Mrs Beer Nut as my beerpal for this month's Session. Beer-drinking friends often refer to having been issued a "pass" to attend events. I never have. I normally bring my pass-issuing authority with me.

Admittedly, our first date was a tour of the Dublin Brewing Company which she had organised, so that should have been an indicator of how things would go from there. She is inordinately tolerant of going the extra mile (or two, or three) with me for the pub that's "meant to be really good, according to a web site I read". As well as chasing a non-existent brewery through nighttime Cairo, this has meant getting utterly lost on Waiheke Island in New Zealand, crossing the ring of steel set up for the World Bank meeting in Singapore to get to the Paulaner Bräuhaus on the other side, and making the out-of-the-way train journeys which brought us to obscure microbreweries in Moss, Bodegraven, Leuven and Hilden. This is not to mention the endless sleeve tugging by which I've led her to brewpubs in otherwise dull parts of Paris, Vienna, St Petersburg, Seoul, Athens, Sydney, Lisbon etc etc. She was even amused to be literally the only woman on our packed flight home from Oktoberfest. Beer tourism is now an intrinsic part of our travel arrangements, where possible, and amazingly she doesn't seem to mind this.

Nor does she mind sharing once we've reached our destination. I'll normally give her first call on ordering interesting new beers, but there's usually quite a bit of give and take on how to divide the menu out between us. Having the extra palate is invaluable for blogging purposes as well -- she'll spot the grapefruit, or the tobacco, or the sherbet long before I will. I'm not running a formal two-hander, but let it be here noted that's there's almost always someone else's observation included with mine on this blog.

Oh, and she also has a tendency to attract pub cats, particularly in the low countries. She's pictured here with one of the residents of Toone in Brussels.

I hope, then, that it's not too on-the-nose for me to have picked Boon's Mariage Parfait as my beer for this post. Through the green glass, skeins of sediment can be seen drifting lazily through the beer, though none is deposited on the bottom of the bottled even though it has been sitting still for a couple of months.

 It delivers all the varying characteristics of the lambic style all at once on the first sip. The sour bitterness, the matured candy, the grainy malt: all there in a big way and all making themselves felt immediately. The only thing it lacks is that astringent nitre brickiness one gets from the like of Oude Geuze Boon. Instead, this is a smoother creature, with all such edges knocked off. There's nothing about balance in the lambic job description, but this one manages to pull it off.

 All-in-all it makes me want to be in Belgium. With the wife, of course.

All Boon and no Bull

Eagle-eyed readers may have noticed that I recently went off on one about Dublin off-licences. The same rant pretty much applies to Dublin pubs as well: that despite their international reputation the vast majority are peddling industrially-manufactured blandness to meet customer demand for same.

Dublin's two brewpubs are exceptions, as is the Bull & Castle, a new gastropub operated by the FXB restaurant chain which opened last year on the site of the Castle Inn. On my first visit I noticed that they were taking their beer seriously and had a fairly extensive and interesting list. My review of Árainn Mhór Rua was based on a bottle from their stocks. I thought little more about the place until the lads over at Irish Craft Brewer mentioned that the Bull & Castle had opened a beerhall and begun "The Beerhall Challenge" -- challengees are given a shortlist of 30 beers to drink (responsibly, without a time limit) and on completion are awarded an engraved glass kept on the premises for their personal use. Last night I signed up. There are very few beers on the list that I haven't already tried and I've already made mention here of a number of them, but any that are new to me or otherwise worthy I will be blogging about.

So, from last night's tastings came Oude Gueze Boon : one of the super-dry, golden lambics made in Brussels, spontaneously fermented by naturally-occurring yeast that lives wild in the area. The supreme champion of this style is Cantillon, made at a craft brewery which doubles as the Gueze Museum. The version Boon make isn't half bad. The nose is very similar to Cantillon -- the dry earthiness of brick-vaulted cellars. On the palate it just tips over into being sour, which I'm sure is intended, but which makes it that little bit harder to drink. You wouldn't necessarily be adding fruit syrup to it, but you can see why some people might.

I strongly urge anyone in Dublin and interested in decent beer to get up to the Bull & Castle. It has certainly opened my eyes regarding what an Irish pub can be. This the The Beer Nut's 100th post and I feel like I'm just getting started...