Pubcast 227 – Beautiful Belgium and Bonus Brit Brews - The Brit and Yankee Craft Beer Pubcast

This week’s episode takes another international focus with a quartet of beers from Belgium, and some classic breweries with tough-to-pronounce names, and classic styles we should all be aware of. If you haven’t tried these, we recommend seeking them out. As a bonus, Phil crack’s open a a couple of cans of Brit craft beer he ‘imported’ from his recent trip to the UK. Plus, Mark surprises us with a ‘bonus bonus’ beer from Florida, to represent the good ol’ USA. It’s a 7-pack this week!

Joining Mark and Phil this week, are podcast regulars, tavern-owner John Karwoski, and assistant brewer from Church Street, Chuck Fort.

0:0 – 15:00 We start with a Kriek beer from Brouwerij Omer Vander Ghinste, Kriek Des Jacobins. This beer is a blend of 12 month old oak aged beer and fresh cherry juice. Offering big sweet candied cherry aromas, it is very fruity yet features an artful balance between sweetness and acidity. The finish is bright with notes of cherry liqueur and almonds.

15:00 – 25:00 Next up is Ichtegem’s Grand Cru, a Flemish Red Ale (Oud Bruin) matured in oak barrels, 6.5% ABV. This unique style of beer is brewed as two separate beers, that are blended together to form the final product.

25:00 – 37:00 Our third bottle comes from Danish brewery, Mikkellar, but it was produced at De Proef Brouwerji, a commercial experimental brewery in northern Belgium, NE of Ghent. Black Imperial Stout, this is the strongest of the collection with an ABV of 16.7%.

37:00 – 50:00 The final bottle of the Belgium quartet comes from Brasserie de Silly, and is one of their annual Scotch Silly variants, a Cognac barrel-aged scotch ale, 11% ABV. Silly is a town in central Belgium, south of Ghent, east of Brussels. This beer is a limited edition, no longer produced, but if you can seek out a bottle it certainly is worth the effort.

50:00 71:00 As a bonus, we have a higher ABV brew from the UK, Gun Brewery Whiskey Imperial Stout which was a one-off and no longer produced, and a southern standard from Harvey’s called Malt Brown.

71:00 – 80:00 The ‘bonus bonus’ beer is a saison from Copperpoint Brewery, Boynton Beach, FL., called Trula. This is a 6.3% ABV, rustic farmhouse Belgian ale, and proves the perfect end to our session.