Your search for chimay returned 3 result(s).
How I choose beer
I’m curious what else you drink (beerwise) and enjoy, and what your favorite breweries are.
I actually don’t drink much — usually just a half-glass of beer or wine once or twice a week with dinner, and an occasional night out (often a Tumblr meetup).
When I go out, I usually follow a simple process when selecting a beer:
- Drafts always get priority.
- Find the ones I’ve never heard of, especially local microbrews.
- Prefer stouts and ales. Lagers are frequently cheap and awful (like cheap college beer), so they get low priority. IPAs get lowest priority because I usually don’t like them.
- For beers with novelty ingredients: Sweet fruits are usually bad. Pumpkin can go either way, but usually isn’t good. Chocolate and espresso are usually good in stouts, and I enjoy milk/cream stouts.
But since I rarely drink beer at home, and I like trying new beer when I’m out, I hardly ever buy any for here. Chimay Blue is a newly discovered exception: it’s so good that I don’t mind having it as the only beer on hand, I haven’t gotten tired of it, and it’s made to stay good for a long time. I bought my 8 bottles before Thanksgiving, gave 2 away, and still have 3.
Whenever I buy any other beer for home, even just a six-pack, it just sits in my fridge for months. The Chimay ages well, almost like wine — most beers don’t.
And given my “never heard of it” criteria for ordering beer when I’m out, I really never develop much preference or recognition for specific breweries. I actually know almost nothing about beer: I hardly even know the difference between ales, lagers, stouts, IPAs, and the other types that I’m sure I’m forgetting. I just know what words are somewhat likely to lead to something I’ll like.
Andrew Fox regarding my beer:
Marco, tell me a little about Chimay Reserve. I’ve never had it, but I’m a huge fan of Belgians in general.
It’s very dense and strong in flavor, very high in alcohol (9%), and very good. The flavor is dominated by heavy, well-rounded barley — the hops flavor is controlled, not too strong like IPAs. It’s very naturally fizzy, and stays fizzy after opening for about a week if you can recork the bottle (like champagne). It’s brewed by monks as an official Trappist ale. It’s so dense, alcoholic, and good that the bottles are closed like champagne bottles (pressurized cork and wire wrap) and it’s meant to be served in a wine glass.
These beer snobs, who know a lot more about beer than me, gave it a higher rating than almost every other widely available beer on their (comprehensive) site.
I suggest you find a nice beer bar to try it. (NYC people: House of Brews has it.) Expect to pay $10-12 per glass. If you’re near a Wegman’s grocery store with a large selection, they sometimes have it there, but only in the stores with the newly expanded international beer section. If you can’t find it, or you want to buy it for home, I found it at this place in New Jersey that ships to a lot of states, including New York. (That’s a 750ml bottle — the same size as most wine bottles. I didn’t realize that when I ordered 8 of them. I have a lot of Chimay now. And it’s completely worth it.)
Chimay Grande Réserve (Blue)
Lee and I drank this beer at the last meetup. It’s excellent, and we loved it. I decided to look it up to see where else I could get it.
Well, a lot of other people love it, too, especially beer experts. Check out those average and editorial ratings.
I accidentally discovered a world-class beer.
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