"Wild Beer" as imagined by Maya Miller

The Sturdy Brewers are making a lot of appearances on this blog, and for good reason — their beers are perfect.  For my recent birthday, Brew Dog t-bone recently brought me back a bottle of De Struise’s Struiselensis from Philly’s so-close-yet-so-far beer Mecca The Foodery, and I was almost as excited (I won’t say more excited) about the De Struise beer he gripped for me as I was for the Bell’s, and if you know me, you know that’s saying a lot.

Struiselensis is more than the “normal” excellent beers that De Struise brews — it is a beer nerd’s dream.  The label alone boasts both the name of the labaratory where the yeasts and bacteria were harvested (Wyeast), and the very varieties of flavor and aroma producing yeast and bacteria employed (Brettanomyces Bruxellensis and Pediococcus Cerivisae).  So back to the old back and forth of cultural exchange — Belgian brewes trying to replicate Belgian styles by relying on American scientific expertise — amazing.

Struiselensis takes its name from a strain of Yeast which originates from the area around Brussells in Belgium where a lot of spontaneous fermentation still occurs.  First isolated in Britian (hence the name Brettanomyces or “British Brewer’s Yeast”), Brettanomyces offers an alternative flavor and aroma profile of the prolific than the standard Saccharomyces Cerevisiae, of which both Ale and Lager types exist.  “Brett Beers” aren’t Ales or Lagers if they are made with 100% Brett — they are just “Brett Beers.”  I’ll be brewing one of these soon and will report here on how it comes out.  When combined with Bacteria which are known to reside in the Barrels and Bottles of such brewing giants as Cantillon, Brett produces extremely complex, earthy beers which completely alter the landscape of Beer tastes, period.  The Struise brewers apparently tried to spontaneously ferment this beer but found their atmospheric components lacking — hence the help from American Yeast Gods Wyeast.

A “Wild” or “Sour” Ale, Struiselensis pours golden and slightly cloudy, with a quickly dissipating white, fizzy head.  Very carbonated as these beers tend to be, the mouthfeel is perfectly dry, complemented by an acidic, tart flavor profile that makes Struiselensis extremely drinkable.  The aroma is hardly captured by the typical flurry of adjectives (”earthy,” “horsey,” “citrusy,” “rotten,” or “leather,” for the record), but can stand to be a pretty decent benchmark for the Sour Ale category and Brett aroma in general (a more citrusy and less hoppy Orval is almost appropriate).  An incredibly drinkable, scientifically miraculous, well-balanced, and yes, Sturdy beer, Struiselensis is a lesson, an experience, and if I had a keg of it in my basement I wouldn’t mind drinking it every night.

Drinking Holiday Beer with Mr. Beer Santa

Winter Beers aren’t really my favorite category — Winter Warmers, Christmas Beers, whatever you call them, they can be overspiced, cloying, and just plain weird when you get the wrong combination of ingredients together.  Unfortunately for me, my birthday falls in the heart of Christmas Beer season, and since birthdays are the time when you get together and make people buy you beers, I usually end up drinking a lot of them.  Fortunately for me, my friends are mostly beer geeks, and I spent my birthday at Spuyten Duyvil, not some shithole bar with no choices, so all of the christmas beers I drank that night were awesome.

The Sturdy Brewers from De Struise went for it with their Winter Beer and called it “Jesus.”  Sure, it’s actually Tsjeeses and is in Dutch, and has another meaning, but for me, it’s Jesus beer.  Like the other beers I’ve tried from De Struise, J-word presents an extremely complex package of flavor and aroma.  It pours a cloudy, thick yellowish/amber color, and smells positively heavenly as soon as you bring it to your grill.  I smelled oxidized sherry flavors, white wine and grapes, spicy, and sweetness.  Tasting it was a similar experience, with the characteristic malty Struise flavor, mixed in with ground spices and intense malt sweetness.  A bit of bitterness keeps this balanced for the most part, but it’s intense.  Worthy of the name for sure, and a hell of a way to keep warm in frozen NYC.

Fantome’s “Noel” beer is one of the few I haven’t had the chance to try that I know about, and I’m pretty sure I drank a fresh bottle, though I’m not sure.  It had a smoky, black appearance, and a smoky black taste.  A Dark Saison is a rare treat, and since Saisons are all that Fantome brews, that’s what we have.  Brewer and artisan Prignon likes to tuck special ingredients into his seasonal brews, and with this once I got lots of dry malt sweetness, the classic Fantome barnyard action, and a big hit of smokey chocolate.  Nice.  A Stout by way of Belgian Farmhouse un-Orthodoxy? Another wonderful Fantome creation and a great experience — a really wonderful bottle.

The Norweigan brewery Nøgne Ø’s Peculiar Yule rounded out the trio of Darkness that I entered into on my birthday night, and it definitely packed a hell of a wallop.  The first, second, and last thing you notice about this beer is the crazy amount of ginger on the nose and on the pallette.  Inbetween there is a rainbow of dark malt, deep fruit, and a nice hit of bitterness as well.  Normally I wouldn’t be so craazy about such a spicy beer but this really hit the spot — it was dry enough, weird enough, and drinkable enough that I could really get into it.

Spuyten Duyvil did a public service by highlighting so many excellet Winter Beers (and giving me a great reason to take a year off from drinking them), and as usual I was rewarded for trying things I “wouldn’t normally” drink.  I drank a lot of beer on my birthday night/weekend/week — more to come from the “first of 09″ selections.

The brewers of De Struise are an intense bunch, as is evidenced by their marathon appearance on The Brewing Network’s “Sunday Session,” a highly recommended piece of Beer Radio that once saved my life on a hectic drive through the Itallian mountains in the middle of the night.  I should state for the record that TBN is highly recommended by this blog, and once you get to “know” the guys on the station, you’ll be going back for more.  Regardless, Carlo and Urbain explained the story behind Pannepot, which was a sort of non-carbonated, thick, syrupy Sailor’s drink which would help them get through the hell that is working on a boat, and the hell that is life between trips at sea.  The De Struise version is a highly malty, delicious, “digestible” beer that has an enormous amount of depth in both aroma and flavor.  Not strikingly dissimiliar from the German Lagers I have been enjoying lately, in fact, and the bottle that I drank which was a few years old had an aged character that lended more complexity to the deal.  I’m becoming more and more fascinated with capturing that malted barley flavor and I intend on pursuing that when my brewing season continues into the Fall and Winter months.  Pannepot is highly recommended and would clearly help you survive the Sailor’s journey.