The best beer in the world

September 2015 

This is the story of how I drank a bottle of the best beer in the world.

While in Brussels, a country famed for its beer, I thought it might be a good idea to get what has been acknowledged as the best beer in the world.

Westvleteren 12 - a beer brewed by Trappist monks, in small batches and with all of its profits going to charitable causes. It's only sold at the Westvleteren monastery/brewery itself in the Belgian countryside and in a tiny number of bottle stores elsewhere. After seeing how highly rated it was, I knew I needed to get some of this stuff.

Then I found out one of these bottle stores was in central Brussels  and I was able to bag a bottle for €12 - success! I brought it back to Blighty to properly enjoy it.

The bottle itself is very interesting - there's no label at all, and all of its information is crammed onto just the bottle cap.

I took it from the fridge, cracked it open, and poured it into a proper Belgian beer glass. 

(Incidentally, that glass was liberated from an unknown establishment by a liberator who told me I could not name her.) 

The beer was a chocolate brown colour, with a noticeable cloudy sediment at the bottom, and only a small amount of head. So much for looks - how did it taste?

It was a bitter, punchy brown ale, with a hint of that Belgian sweetness. It was actually quite similar to Duvel and Tripel beer you can buy in New Zealand but slightly richer brown ale. As it settled, it got a slightly maltier flavour. To sum it up - unfortunately pretty average, possibly even a sub-par beer.

I did wonder whether I hadn't pour it properly, as a fair bit of sediment was in the glass. But even when the sediment had settled the flavour was pretty much the same. So no real issues there.

So all in all, a pretty disappointing beer. There are much better and cheaper Belgian beers available - like Chimay. I can't help but think its reputation is mostly down to its rarity and the romanticism about it being a monk brewed beer rather than its actual flavour. Maybe beer tasting is getting as pretentious as wine tasting.

Or maybe I just got a bad bottle.