Gueuze 1882 (Black label)

Description

Gueuze 1882 (Black label) is a gueuze brewed and blended on-site by Girardin. Unlike Girardin Gueuze 1882 (White label), it is unfiltered and unpasteurized. It is labeled as 5% ABV and is bottled in both 375ml and 750ml bottles.

Notes / Other History

Unlike traditional oude gueuze which consists of a blend of one-, two-, and three-year old lambic, Girardin Black is a blend of twelve-, eighteen-, and twenty-four-month old lambic. According to Paul Girardin, he "blend[s] lambics of 12, 18, and 24 months to make the Oude Gueuze. The 2-year-old lambic is for complexity, light acidity and maturity; the year-old version is to spark a refermentation, and the 18-month-old lambic is used to balance the 1- and 2 year-old versions."^[1]

Though there is no complete bottle log for this gueuze, Girardin Black, as it is colloquially referred to, dates back to at least the 1990's. The bottles are not dated; however, beginning in the mid 2000's the corks began to show bottling batch numbers. For example Ax2013 is commonly referred to as a 2013 batch. However, bottling batch numbers should only be used as a reference and may not necessarily indicate the bottling year as certain batches have arrived on store shelves prior to the year marked (e.g., Ax2013 arrived on store shelves in the United States in late-2012).

Girardin Black is available around the world, but it is only available in 37,5cl bottles in the United States. Both 750ml and 375ml bottles can be ordered from various Belgian webshops.