Tongerlo

What a strangely named beer! Tongerlo is a golden triple that is very refined and delicious. If you can find it, drink it!

St Bernardus Abt 12

When I was in Belgium I searched high and low for a beer called Westvelteryn. It is a Trappist beer that is not exported out of Belgium and is only made in small batches. I didn't find a bar that had it. One bar introduced me to this Westvelteryn-clone, St. Bernardus. It is very sweet, high in alcohol, and overall superb. Maybe on my next trip I will find the elusive original.

Leute

I first thougth that Leute was a Belgian beer. It is very refined and rich, with a lot of surprisingly tasty sediment. It has a hint of apple taste (which I don't normaly like). Oh, yeah, its from Germany.

King of Beers

Lion Stout has a picture of Michael Jackson (the beer critic, not singer) on the back. It is a nice rich beer with a creamy latte-like head. It says that it has one international gold medals at beer competitions. Not bad for a beer from Sri Lanka.

Prior Party

Kapittel Watou is just like the label shows: a good beer to drink with your fellow monks. This 9% beer has fruity notes but is not overly sweet. Quite nice.

Amber Gold

Golden Carolus Ambrio definitely has some of the best bottle art. Not surpisingly, what is inside the bottle rocks! There are three or four Carolus beers (only two of which I have tried) and this one is the best so far. It has a dark amber color and a very rich, sweet taste-- a beer to nurse slowly.

Orval Reddenbacker...not!

Orval, one of the seven Trappist (made or supervised by monks) brews from Belgium, is a bit of a curiosity. The first couple of times that I had it I thought that it wasn't very good. It is dark, 8%, a bit hoppy and not especia;ly sweet. After drinking it you get a tingling in your stomach similar to drinking Puer tea--kind of warm. The taste is complex and not easy to compare to other beers. Still, in Europe it is highly regarded, and I heard quite a few Europeans mention it as their favorite beer. Go figure...try it yourself and tell me what you think. The jury is still out.