Oud Beersel Green Walnut Lambic
Brouwerij Oud Beersel

750ml bottle into a tulip. 2018 vintage. Missed the best by date by a month, doubt it matters.

Looks superb in the glass. Slightly hazy honey colored body. Foamy white head maintains throughout leaving layers of lacing.

There is a mild funk to the aroma.

On tasting, certainly tart and sour. There is a woody aspect which could be foeder or could be the green walnuts. Whatever it is, it's certainly appealing.

Mouth full, finish tart.

Overall, glad I picked this one up. Green walnuts instead of fruit is an interesting take on a lambic.

750 ml corked & caged bottle, vintage 2017, from Vinmonopolet, Nettbutikken. ABV is 6.0%. Shared with my son. Golden colour, huge white head. Lovely aroma of brettanomyces and farmhouse kitchen, hints of oaked apple cider. Fairly sour and dry flavour, notes of brettanomyces, hints of apple cider vinegar. A moderate bitterness, probably more from the green walnuts than the hops.

 

 

 

 

 

 

A 750ml corked and caged bottle, 2018 vintage, with a best before date of 7th June 2022. Poured into a 3 Fonteinen gueuze glass.

Appearance: A hazy golden orange colour, with an almost two finger white head that dissipated fairly quickly, but settled to a thin cap, while leaving sparse lacing.

Aroma: Seemed a bit weak, but there’s oak, hay, barnyard, herbs, and citrus rind notes.

Taste: Sour, tart, barnyard, funky, citrus rind, lightly bitter, white wine, and light berry notes.

Mouthfeel: Medium bodied with moderate to soft but spritzy carbonation.

Overall: Any walnut flavour or aroma was not clear to me, but the overall result was enjoyable with good citrus and berry flavours complementing the sour, funky and bitter notes.

This is criminally underrated, a fantastic lambic. My bottle had 2 years of age, would love to find another to lay down for years to mature further. Clearly bubbly golden pour with a plump eggshell white head. Smell has a bright and sunny disposition: airy hay and esters of lemon, apple and the green walnut, with sour oak backing and complex layers of horse blanket, barnyard and wild funk. Taste follows the nose, with kisses of acidity, sweeter citrus zest injected, freshly blooming flowers, and a mild vinegar pungent undergirding that really accents the funks and hay well. Feel is higher in carbonation, funky, tart, very slightly acidic certainly not as acidic as it taste, bright and generally a delicate beauty.

Surprisingly tasteful.
I expected it to be good (big Oud Beersel fan), but it's even better than I expected.
The walnut adds bitterness to what is a very fresh and dry geuze.
But it's a different bitterness than what you get from hops, don't quite know how to explain it.

Maybe this helps.
When I eat fresh walnuts from our yard I get the same kind of bitterness out of chewing on the thin "membrane" that covers the actual nutty part. It's a bitterness that sticks to your teeth kinda.

2018 bottle
Bright golden orange, ample lasting foam and a collar of sticky lacing.
Aroma is straightforward citrus acidity and wet hay.
Tart and juicy citrus, lemon and crabapple, not much walnut.
Medium to light bodied, effervescent and spritzy.
Very drinkable, though not especially unique.
Not as good as batch #1 i’ve heard.

Bottle: Poured a golden color lambic with a nice large off-white foamy head with good retention and some lacing. Aroma of funky ester with some green apple notes and oak is quite pleasant. Taste is a good mix of funky ester with some green apple notes, some oak, very subtle acidic notes with some light barnyard notes also noticeable. Body is about average with some lively carbonation. Super enjoyable with perfect mix of complexity and drinkability but I can’t say that walnut are easily identifiable in the flavours.

 

a beer i have wanted and waited to try since i first learned of its existence, and it was worth the wait! this ended up being one of my favorite lambics of all time, and despite the ratings here that make it seem like just another weird one, its a true standout, exemplary really, and something i really hope to encounter again, its just magic. shockingly lively from the bottle, really active and fizzy and excited feeling, which i love in the style but dont see as often as i would like. the aroma is classic beersel lambic to me, funky and mature with a little bit of honey sort of sweetness to it, some floral notes there, the earthy wheat, iodine, oak, herbs, and white wine acidity. its sexy right there, but the pungent green walnut character adds a lot, reminds me of the ones that used to fall from trees at the house i grew up at, which might have actually been black walnuts, but the casings were green, anyway the yard used to be full of them each year, such a strong odor, and it comes through the flavor uniquely as well, surprisingly delicate for how intense this can be in nature. subtle hints of vanilla, good champagne, musty basement, and wet raked leaves. the lambic underneath is amazing too, tart but not super sour, really funky and wild tasting, but super clean in the finish. the walnut is there all the way. this is brilliant beer, one that i now hold in the highest regard, and one where the hype i built up in my head was actually lived up to by the beer. truly special, one of a kind beer. unforgettably good, and awesome to get to share it with my homies!

750ml bottle, 2017 vintage. Snifter glass. Cloudy darker golden yellow body, one finger white head, thin collar, a bit of lacing. Smell is intensely funky, oak, a bit floral and moderately tart, a bit of spent grain, leather, lemon zest. It smells and tastes like a funky lambic by any other name; the green walnut seems to impart a sweeter tartness and a bit of floral notes to it. Mouthfeel is medium bodied, good carbonation, a bit floral with a fair bit of mild-moderate acetic acidity on the finish.

 

 

 

 

 

Bottle courtesy of Kim -- thanks!

Lemongrass, lemony twang, earthy yeast, obvious brettanomyces funkiness.

Lovely. A beer I intend to revisit for a full review.

B+ / VERY GOOD

 

Bottle from 2016 poured into 4 wine glasses! The pour was very carbonated!! Looks like a golden hazy IPA but with a fizzy head that is soapy looking leaving minimal lacing behind. Smells like hay, wood, nutty, citrus, spicy, funky. The taste is very unique and good: funky, citrus, peppers, hay, loads of funk in a good/complex way! The feel is effervescent, sharp, spicy and dry! Overall this is delicious and unique, going let the other sit for years to see what happens!

Pretty interesting idea- walnut lambic. It doesn't have an obvious impact in the nose that I notice. The smell is lambic- lemon, funk, wheat. The funk is relatively light. Taste is also pretty clean lambic. Moderate funk, lemon, wheat. Mild sourness, very dry finish. Again, I don't know what the walnuts are contributing, but they may well be there. Whatever the walnut does, it is a good but not outstanding lambic.

 

 

2015 bottling pours a crystal clear copper color with a skimpy white head.

This is fruity sour with a hint of cider and lemony lactic. As it breathes it gets a little earthy with brett.

Taste is earthen upfront than quite lemony lactic with cider notes and oak. It is quite tart with a very mild brett feel.

This is light in body with a low level of carbonation. I have no idea what the walnuts were suppose to contribute here but I did not notice it. I will say though that this lambic was more enjoyable than any of my prior exposure/experience with product from beersel. Would seek out again.

 

 

 

Not sure what green walnut in a gueuze is supposed to taste like, but this was enjoyable. If I hadn't known, I would have never guessed it. Tasted a little earthier and 'green' I supposed, but that's it.

On tap at CBC 2016, day 2. Hazy yellow with no head. Lambic funk, blue cheese, mould, grapefruit.

750 mL bottle. 2015 bottle. Pours clear orange. Nose has a light fruitiness, some toasted oak, yogurt acidity. Tastes very yogurty with an ample malt flavor. Oaky with a little bit of vinegar sourness. Medium body, high carbonation. Not sure what green walnut tastes like, so I don't know what aspect is green walnut.

 

750 into snifter

L - Pours clear golden straw with thin head and lacing
S - Big funk and sour - not getting much in the way of anything else and the walnut isn't coming through
T - More of the same on the palate - basically a super tasty straight lambic, but the walnut is barely there both of us trying this had to search really hard to find anything in the background and it was the subtlest of hints
F - classic light and dry. Perhaps a touch oily (might be the nuts showing up)

Overall solid, very tasty, but not entirely what it says on the box - delicious, but I was hoping for something more in the way of walnut character