Gueuze: The Champagne of Craft Beer

With a new year swiftly approaching, it’s time to dust off that lambic basket and prepare to ring in 2017 with a beverage far superior to champagne.

- Chris Quest

Everyone is familiar with Miller High Life’s classic marketing axiom claiming it as “The Champagne of Beers.” While most suds-swilling consumers of mass-market macro lagers are happy to guzzle down pint after pint of a beer that features this rather bold claim (especially for a flavorless American Lager), true connoisseurs of craft beer know there’s a far better exemplar to hold the mantle of “champagne of beers” than Miller High Life: the ancient and fascinating Gueuze style.

Created from a centuries-old farmhouse brewing and blending recipe from Brussels’ Senne Valley area, Gueuze is a lambic-style that is made by blending young (usually around a year old) and old (2-3 years old) lambics then bottle-conditioning them for their secondary fermentation. Gueuze are known for being extraordinarily effervescent, betraying an impressive carbonic profile – one of the reasons why they serve as the perfect craft beer replacement for actual champagne, or the unspeakable Miller High Life.