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European Sour Ale / 23D

Lambic

Unfiltered BJCP Styles Style Profile

Official BJCP guideline sections attached for full style exploration.

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Source
BJCP 2021 Beer Style Guidelines

Overall Impression

A fairly sour, often moderately funky, wild Belgian wheat beer with sourness taking the place of hop bitterness in the balance. Traditionally served uncarbonated as a café drink.

Aroma

Young versions can be quite sour and fruity, but can develop barnyard, earthy, goaty, hay, horsey, or horse blanket funkiness with age. The fruit character can take on a light citrus fruit, citrus rind, pome fruit, or rhubarb quality, getting more complex with age. Malt can have a light bready, grainy, honey, or wheat-like quality, if noticeable. Should not have enteric, smoky, cigar-like, or cheesy faults. No hops.

Appearance

Pale yellow to deep golden in color; age tends to darken the beer. Clarity is hazy to good. Younger versions are often cloudy, while older ones are generally clear. White colored head generally has poor retention.

Flavor

Young versions often have a strong lactic sourness with fruity flavors (same descriptors as aroma), while aged versions are more balanced and complex. Funky notes can develop over time, same descriptors as aroma. Low bready, grainy malt. Bitterness generally below sensory threshold; sourness provides the balance. No hop flavor. Dry finish, increasing with age. Should not have enteric, smoky, cigar-like, or cheesy faults.

Mouthfeel

Light to medium-light body; should not be watery. Has a medium to high tart, puckering quality without being sharply astringent. Traditional versions are virtually to completely uncarbonated, but bottled examples can pick up moderate carbonation with age.

Comments

A single-batch, unblended beer, reflecting the house character of the brewery. Generally served young (6 months) from the cask. Younger versions tend to be one-dimensionally sour since a complex Brett character takes a year or more to develop. A noticeable vinegary or cidery character is considered a fault by Belgian brewers. Typically bottled only when completely fermented. Lambic sweetened with raw sugar at service time is known as Faro.

Characteristic Ingredients

Pilsner malt, unmalted wheat. Aged hops (3+ years) used more as a preservative than for bitterness. Spontaneously fermented with naturally occurring yeast and bacteria in well-used, neutral oak barrels.

Style Comparison

Often has a simpler sourness and less complexity than a Gueuze, but more variability from batch to batch. Traditionally served uncarbonated from pitchers, while Gueuze is bottled and very highly carbonated.

Vital Statistics

IBU
0 - 10
SRM
3 - 6
OG
1.040 - 1.054
FG
1.001 - 1.010
ABV
5% - 6.5%

Commercial Examples

  • Cantillon Grand Cru Bruocsella. In the Brussels area
  • De Cam
  • Cantillon
  • Drie Fonteinen
  • Lindemans
  • Timmermans
  • Girardin and others

Style Attributes

pale-color sour standard-strength traditional-style western-europe wheat-beer-family wild-fermented

Similar Styles: How to Tell Them Apart

Use these guideline-based sensory contrasts to organize comparative tasting practice.

These Belgian wild wheat beers share dry acidity, fruit, funk, very low bitterness, and no hop flavor. Straight Lambic is the stiller, more variable single-batch beer; Gueuze is a blended, highly carbonated, more complex expression; Fruit Lambic adds a clearly fermented fruit character to a Gueuze-like wild base.

Compare with: 23E. Gueuze; 23F. Fruit Lambic

By aroma

  • Lambic ranges from young sour fruit to older barnyard, earth, hay, horsey, or horse-blanket funk over light wheat or grain.
  • It is generally simpler and more batch-variable than Gueuze and lacks Fruit Lambic's dominant specified-fruit aroma.

By taste

  • Lambic can be strongly lactic and fruity when young, becoming drier, funkier, and more balanced with age.
  • Traditional examples are virtually uncarbonated, the clearest contrast with effervescent Gueuze.
  • Its dry sour-funky profile has no hops and usually less developed complexity than the blended styles.

Quick tell: A still or lightly carbonated, variable wild wheat beer points to straight Lambic.

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