Delirium Tremens – Belgian Beer Review
May 21, 2010
Delirium Tremens is a well known Belgian brew from the owners of the Delirium Café in Brussels. I visited the Café on my trip to Brussels in October 2008 and reported back on my own website if you want to check it out.
Delirium Tremens itself is distinctive, with a bottle that looks ceramic and a blue foil cap. The label is decorated with pink elephants (also the logo of the Brussels café) and alligators wearing shades. That should give you a clue that we’re not expecting anything particularly subtle here. Having said that, it’s been going strong (no pun intended) for over twenty years which proves that isn’t a flash in the pan. It’s actually brewed for the Delirium Café boys by Brewery Huyghe in the Belgian town of Melle, near Ghenmt. Huyghe have been brewing beer since 1654, so they should know their stuff!
This is a well respected brew, it was voted ‘Best Beer in the World’ at the World Beer Championships in Chicago, 1998, Stuart Kallen (who?) rated it number one in his “50 Greatest Beers in the World” and, more relevantly to me at least Michael Jackson rated it in his top 500 beers.
Having said that, it’s brewed to a disrespectable 9% ABV using a complex recipe that claims to use three different yeasts.
It pours a pale amber colour with a reasonable head that is slow to disperse and clings tenaciously to the side of the glass.
The nose is redolent of fruit, apples and ripe bananas, with underlying spicy notes.
Those fruit notes are reflected in the taste, along with a bready flavour. But it’s the fruit that dominates, there are apples and pears in there, and a sort of pineapple flavour.
Not ‘real’ pineapple, it’s the sort of pineapple flavour I associate with pineaaple flavoured boiled sweets – here in the UK we have ‘Cola Cubes’, ‘Pear Drops’ and ‘Pineapple Cubes’ – I’ve never noticed anything similar on my trips to the States, and they’re difficult to describe, effectively being lumps of flavoured sugars (the cubes are about a centimetre each side) – are they known as ‘hard candy’ or ‘suckers’?
Anyway, once you get through the sweetness and the fruit flavours there are background spices – cloves, coriander and white pepper.
If you’re used to the flavour of strong belgian ales you’ll notice the distinctive candy sugar alcohol flavour lurking in the background, that’s not wholly unexpected in a 9% ale.
All in all, and after careful consideration I’m going to give this three stars. I’m not wholly convinced that this is a classic beer. It might creep into my own Top 500, but not very high.
Rating: 
Bob the Brit
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Posted in 3 Star Reviews, Belgian Beers, Views from a Brit
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May 21st, 2010 at 9:57 am
I fully agree with you. It is a good beer, but in no way a classic. There isn’t really anything special about it and I felt that it came up lacking.
.-= Nate´s last blog ..Simple way to add complexity to homebrew =-.
May 21st, 2010 at 11:03 am
I’ll still try it eventually. I really enjoyed their Christmas beer quite a bit.
.-= Scott-TheBrewClub´s last blog ..Helios Ale – Victory Brewing Company =-.
May 21st, 2010 at 11:18 am
Top 500? Have you ever drank 500 beers? It just sounds like in that kind of range it should have received 2 or 1.5 stars not 3. I would think that 3 star brews would be solidly in your top 200 beers? Just seems like a really off thing to say after you gave it 3 stars. Like you say Scot 3 stars is a good review for you.
.-= Don´s last blog ..Oskar Blues Gubna: Don’t Meass with Texeas =-.
May 21st, 2010 at 2:28 pm
@Don – where Bob’s from, its not uncommon to have 500 or so beers in a week. Look, when you put beer on your cereal, brush your teeth with beer, bathe in beer, your body absorbs a lot more than we Americans are accustomed to!
.-= Scott-TheBrewClub´s last blog ..Avery Hog Heaven-Barleywine Style Ale =-.
May 21st, 2010 at 3:19 pm
It’s a great beer, but Nocturnum is much better, in my opinion. I’ve got a bottle of 2009 that I’ve been saving for a while.
.-= nate´s last blog ..I Drink Beer & It Makes Me Happy =-.
May 21st, 2010 at 3:26 pm
Sorry Scott, Didn’t see that the review was from Bob. I should have known, it was at least 4 paragraphs shorter than your standard review. And you would have never used the word “redolent”, in Scott language that would have been “kinda like”. But point well taken, Bob has probably forgotten more beers than I have ever drank.
.-= Don´s last blog ..Oskar Blues Gubna: Don’t Meass with Texeas =-.
May 21st, 2010 at 5:38 pm
Those pink elephants are rather hypnotic. The seem to say: “Drink this beer. You will be assimilated. Resistance is futile.” Sort of like a Borg-ish pachyderm.
Overall, it’s a a good beer, not great. I’d drink it again.
.-= Big Tex´s last blog ..Texas Beer Traveling =-.
May 21st, 2010 at 7:51 pm
@Don. I’m ‘kinda like’ getting an idea how Jim feels. And sure, why wouldn’t I have tried 500 beers? I am 82 ya know!
Still, I do wish this theme had a better post author identity system for people like you. Something with BIG pictures so there is no confusion as to who kinda wrote the review!
@Nate- I’m kinda looking forward to the Nocturnum too!
@Big Tex – I’d agree. The label is ‘kinda like’ cool!
.-= Scott-TheBrewClub´s last blog ..Lomza Polish Beer – This Week’s Lawnmower Beer =-.
May 22nd, 2010 at 1:13 am
Well guys, I confess that I hit fifty three this week, and have been enjoying beers since I was about seventeen. That’s thirty six years of drinking, or 432 months, so a new beer every month or so gets awfully close to 500 beers. But you’re right @Don, I probably have about fifty beers I would judge noteworthy. Heck I was only basing the 500 number on a book someone else wrote. Kinda like 501 movies you must see (if you don’t have any friends).
I agree with @Big Tex – “a good beer, not great. I’d drink it again.”
And as for better identification of a post’s author, well as @Don observed, you might get a clue as to whether it’s one of my reviews based on
1) a rambling introduction
2) flowery Brit language and
3) a photo taken in my kitchen.
That’s fine by me, I don’t write these for fame, as the tagline on this site used to read “It’s about the beer.”
.-= Bob the Brit´s last blog ..Hanging on the Telephone =-.
May 22nd, 2010 at 10:39 am
Bob, I’m confused as to who writes the rambling introductions!!!!
You’re right though, it is really about the beer in contrast to Don who is in it for the groupies.
.-= Scott-TheBrewClub´s last blog ..Chalky’s Bark and Chalky’s Bite Beer =-.
January 5th, 2011 at 5:27 pm
Finally got to try this over the Christmas holiday, and while I liked it, I thought Delirium Noel was a better beer overall. Now I need to check out Nocturnum!
.-= Scott-TheBrewClub´s last blog ..Sam Adams Infinium – Did you try it =-.
September 18th, 2011 at 7:33 pm
I had this at a beer festival yesterday; tried it again today. I’d say it’s a very good beer. My friends and I all found the Belgian beers more complex, with fruitier aromas, than the UK ones we tried. I couldn’t say whether it’s a “great”; I haven’t tried enough yet to say. It’s not quite as good for me as Orval, still my favourite Belgian, but it’s not far off. For the strength, it is delicious and smooth.
September 18th, 2011 at 9:09 pm
@Scyrene – Thanks for the comment! If you get a chance to try Delirium Noel when its that time of year, I recommend it!