Spuyten Duyvil is a bar in Williamsburg, Brooklyn which specializes in Belgian Beer, but has a lot of great selections to offer in general — usually one selection on Cask, 5 or 6 on regular draught, and a ton of amazing bottles to choose from. Since we had some friends in from out of town and were in a celebratory mood, Ceeg and I took John to Spuyten Duyvil and ended up embarking down a road of Lambic delight, sampling three different beers from Hanssens, one of the foremost makers of Gueuze and Lambic in Belgium. “To me,” the very European sounding bartender woman purred, “Hanssens and Cantillon are equally good,” which was enough of an endorsement for me, as I love Cantillon and have enjoyed many of their brews.

I decided to start with the Oude Gueuze, which as reported by the Hanssens website, “…is the result of blending different lambics of different ages. The second fermentation takes place inside the bottles and therefore they are stored for minimum six months in constant temperature kept cellars.” I wanted to try what was essentially the base of the other two Hanssens that they were pouring, the Oude Kriek and the Mead the Gueuze, and I was not disappointed. This is truly the most intense and over the top smelling and tasting beer that I have ever had the absolute pleasure to sip outside in the backyard of a Belgian Beer Bar in my own god-damned home town. Passing the glass around was hilarious, as John and Steve (who had joined us by this point) were shocked at how intense it was, while Ceeg and I couldn’t stop sipping.

The Oude Gueuze pours a beautiful color with a small head and nice carbonation, and has so much intense and intricate sour flavor that it really pushes your face around when you sip. Ceeg had ordered the Oude Kriek, which is the Lambic base refermeted with fresh cherries. This Kriek kicks the living shit out of any heavily sweetened Lambic I have ever had the unfortunate pleasure to pay too much money for. A Lambic is supposed to be more sour than sweet as I understand, and I certainly prefer it this way. While the cherries added a hint of sweetness to counterbalance how intensely sour they are, in addition to the Lambic base they are being added too, the sourness still wins. This beer poured a rich deep ruby color and had the perfect level of carbonation. This was truly a revelatory tasting for us and it was only to get better!

The last bottle they offered (all three are corked and caged like mini-Champagne bottles and had varying degrees of insane funk collected on them from years of storage and aging) was the most out there of all — “Mead The Gueuze,” which is a mixture of 70% Hanssens Gueuze and 30% Lurgashall Mead. This is seriously one of the most inventive and amazing Belgian (with a little help from the UK — Lurgashall is British) beers I have ever had the pleasure of tasting. It smells like straight up honey and flowers, and adds a bit of spiciness to the traditional Gueuze profile, which is almost always a welcome addition for me. The mouthfeel and taste are just as intense as the smell, and Ceeg and I could hardly believe how smooth and drinkable it was. It’s great to know that old school Brewers are reaching out and collaborating, and this beer is a fantastic result of the kind of cross-pollination that is making drinking beer today so interesting and enjoyable.

I learned a lot about Gueuze and Lambic that night, and I hope to continue to pursue trying as many different styles as I can which come straight from Belgium, while searching the United States for styles that are influenced by these techniques. More on these soon.

My lambic experience is admittedly limited, but now I’m hooked. I think my hop addiction may even be put on hold while I seek out the stinkiest beers I can find in the city. And thats what hit’s you first when you get your glass of Cantillon, the stink. It smells like the 4H barn at the State Fair if someone tried to cover up the natural odor with Sweet Tart scented air freshener, and there’s some citrus and hay in there as well as a bit of stinky cheese… yeah it’s complex. There’s a pretty heavy pucker when you suck it down, but the flavor isn’t at all overwhelming. Its actually really refreshing and drinkable, and I was ordering doubles to get a full pint all week while it was on. I could definitely drink as many of these as I could afford this summer if it stayed available.

The Russian River Beatification was actually a lot weirder than this guy, though, and I’m really looking forward to finding out what other oddities are out there in the world of spontaneous/Brett/infected beers in the New Weird Craft Brewing tradition, in addition to sampling as many of the Belgian classics as I can get my hands on.