Boon

I’ve long enjoyed Boon’s series of Mono Blends, which are basically single-barrel Geuzes. They even release a Discovery Box of four different Vats for easy comparison. By my count, I’ve had 7 different Mono Blends, and there’s a surprising amount of variance between them. Some really lean into what I think of as Boon’s house minerality, some are brighter and fruity, others are more funky and earthy, and so on. Eat your heart out, whiskey!

What we have here today is Boon Oude Geuze Apogee, which is brewed in honor of the two generations of family brewing talent now working at Boon. To symbolize the transition, this blend primarily consists of 2 year old lambic from Boon’s newest foeder (Vat N°83) and 3 year old lambic from Boon’s oldest foeder (Vat N°79 which, incidentally, is my favorite of the Mono Blends).

No sisyphean power struggles for succession in the Boon family, which may not be as exciting as Frank Boon pitting his two sons against one another in a bloody battle royale; two men enter, one man leaves and gets to continue making lambic… but hey, I guess we’ll just have to console ourselves with some fine lambic wares:

Boon Oude Geuze Apogee – Pours an almost clear yellow gold color with a finger of white head and moderate retention. Smells of sweet, tart fruit, oak, a bit of minerally funk. Taste starts with that sweet, tart fruit but quickly moves into that minerality that I always associate with Boon, then some more complex earthy funk, oak and a hint of vanilla, finishing on that tart fruit note again with some minerality sticking around. Mouthfeel is light bodied, well carbonated, and crisp, moderate acidity but still nicely dry. Overall, really solid and interesting little Geuze; not quite Boon’s best, but it’s a blend worthy of the celebration. B+

Beer Nerd Details: 7% ABV bottled (750 ml caged and corked). Drank out of a flute glass on 9/30/22. Batch #: 14902. Best Before: 31/12/2039. Bottled: 29/4/2019.

Always love the novelty of new Boon releases, though I will almost always find myself falling back on my beloved Boon Black Label (at this point I am contractually obligated to note that, as much as I love the beer, the label is not actually black, which has always annoyed me).

For anything that is primarily blended, there’s this instinct to see what individual components would taste like. You see this a lot in whiskey, but there are plenty of other applications as well. Take this series of Mono Blends from Boon. Each is primarily composed of lambic from a single foeder (blended with a very small amount of young lambic for bottle conditioning purposes), and this is the third one that I’ve had. Unfortunately, I’ve had them over the course of 2-3 years, so this isn’t exactly a side-by-side comparison, but I feel like all three have been somewhat distinct.

Vat 77 was very earthy with a big kick of minerality. Vat 79 was noticeably more fruity and tart, though it still retained that mineral character that I seem to get out of all of Boon’s lambic. Now we’ve got Vat 109, a 9000 liter cask built over a hundred years ago (approx 1910 timeframe) and originally made to be used in beer production. That being said, it was used to age Cognac starting in 1935 up until Boon got their hands on it in 2009. This particular batch was brewed in 2014 and released in 2016, only showing up on my local shelves recently (at least, that I saw). With acknowledgement to the infamously unreliable nature of memory, I’d put this somewhere on the continuum between Vat 77’s earthy minerality and Vat 79’s more fruity character, though all have what I’m coming to recognize as Boon’s trademark character.

Boon Oude Geuze A L’Ancienne Vat 109 Mono Blend – Pours a hazy golden color with a couple fingers of fluffy, fizzy head that manages to stick around for a bit. Smells great, lots of earthiness, that trademark Boon minerality, and something brighter, fruitier in the background. Taste hits that mineral character pretty hard, lots of earthy funk, with a touch of sourness and fruit only really emerging in the finish. Mouthfeel is medium bodied, highly carbonated, crisp, and effervescent, lowish acidity. Overall, this is another solid offering from the Mono Blend line, maybe not quite as great as 79, but still damn good. B+

Beer Nerd Details: 8.25% ABV bottled (375 ml caged and corked). Drank out of a geuze tumbler on 11/4/17. Best Before 04/19/2025. Batch #: 71312.

I have some extra bottles of Vat 79 and now 109, so maybe one day I’ll be able to do a better, side by side comparison (perhaps we can wait until we get some additional batches out there), which would be entirely more reliable than drinking these suckers months/years apart and trying to discern the differences that way.

If not for the 10% young lambic blended into this beer (which provides enough lively yeast and fermentables to allow for carbonation in the bottle), it would be something akin to Single Barrel Lambic, an intriguing concept. The other 90% is sourced from a single oak foudre, numbered (you guessed it) 77. This particular cask was originally made in 1907, and while it’s survived two world wars and undoubtedly seen other uses during its long history, it’s been used by Boon to age three year old lambic for use in their gueuze blends since 1986. Apparently Frank Boon has a particular love for the beer that comes out of this cask, and so when they started this mono-blend series, it was only a matter of time before it was selected for a release. These fine folks even managed to snag a picture of the foudre:

(Click to embiggen)

Of course, these foudres are gigantic (averaging 8,000 liters each), so don’t expect to see anything like the Single Barrel Bourbon or Scotch world, where local stores pick a barrel and bottle it, but wouldn’t that be neat if beer could pull off something like that? You know someone would take a flier on a Password is Taco barrel or snag a single barrel BCBS, or fly to Belgium and snag a Cantillon barrel. I doubt most breweries would be all that keen on the prospect, but who knows? Maybe one of these big barrel programs will differentiate themselves with this sort of thing (and, you know, do a better job than Retribution). In the meantime we’ll have to make due with approximations like this Mono Blend, which was actually a really interesting beer and something I’d like to compare against future releases… Let’s take a look at how it’s drinking now:

Boon Oude Gueuze A L’ancienne Vat 77 Mono Blend – Pours an almost clear golden color with a finger of fluffy head that lasts for a bit, but not indefinitely. Smells quite funky, lots of earthiness, lots of farmhouse, maybe even some funky cheese character. Taste also goes quite earthy, and frankly doesn’t feel all that sour at all, lots of leathery farmhouse character, not as cheesy as the nose would have you believe I guess, but still quite different than I’m used to for a Gueuze. Mouthfeel is well carbonated, medium bodied, only a very slight hint of acidity, much more funky than sour. Overall, this is an interesting beer! I don’t quite know what to make of it, actually, as it’s really quite nice, but also not your typical Gueuze… B+

Beer Nerd Details: 8.5% ABV bottled (375 ml caged and corked). Drank out of a tumbler on 11/7/15. Brewed 10/26/11 and 10/27/11. Bottled 10/24/13. Best before 10/24/2033.

Next up in the Mono Blend series is Vat 79, which is apparently the oldest cask they have, dating back to 1883. Would love to compare these two next to each other someday. In the meantime, Boon is one of the few Lambic producers who you can actually find, so go out there and snag some of those Marriage Parfaits, they’re pretty good too.

So now that I’ve climbed aboard the Gueuze train to sour town, I’m picking up whatever examples I can get my hands on. So far, no Cantillon or Drie Fonteinen to be found, but this one popped on my radar during my latest trip to Pinocchio’s. Boon’s regular Oude Geuze often seems to be referred to as a beginner’s sour, and consists of 90% lambic aged for 18 months, 5% lambic aged for 3 years, and 5% “young” lambic. This Mariage Parfait version differs in that it consists of 95% lambic aged for 3 years, and 5% “young” lambic. A “perfect wedding” of new and old? Let’s find out:

Boon Oude Geuze Mariage Parfait – Pours an orange color with a finger or two of bubbly white head that quickly recedes. Smells of funky oak and ripe fruits. Taste is sweet, with plenty of funky earth in the middle and some sour fruitiness emerging towards the finish, along with earthy oak. Mouthfeel is highly carbonated and effervescent, but crisp and refreshing. Overall, a solid Gueuze that I very much enjoyed, but not quite to the levels of Tilquin. B+

Beer Nerd Details: 8% ABV bottled (375 ml, caged and corked). Drank out of a tulip glass on 11/17/12.

My renewed interest in Gueuze and lambics in general will continue, abated only by lack of availability. Alas, I’m not able to make it to Zwanze day on Saturday, so I may have to wait a bit longer for my first Cantillon… But don’t worry, Loons will be slayed. It’s only a matter of time.