Welcome to the best beers of all time. The beers listed and reviewed on this page are those that have features in the Top 10 beers in our Beer Ratings Chart (now containing 3621 different beers). Only the best have survived up there at the top. Others have floundered. For my full beer reviews, go to the beer review page, or to view the full Beer Ratings Chart, go to the Beer Chart Introduction Page.
Throughout the years, Van Honsebrouck K8 has remained the unchallenged champion of all beers. Given that the beer chart now comprises almost 4000 different beers, that is an extreme achievement by the Van Honsebrouck Brewery. Strictly speaking, K8 is a kriek beer, but it excels far beyond what you'd expect from a kriek. The cherries almost have a spicy texture, and there seem to be a lot of almonds in there too. The fruit is accompanied by a distinct maltiness, made all the more enticing by the fruity, leather-like aroma. It also has a very sweet smell.
K8 is a full-bodied beer with a warming texture, especially on the palate. The mouthfeel also presents some woodiness. It has a decent head of froth, with some lacing.
There are notes of chocolate throughout every aspect of the tasting of this beer. It is perfect, exquisite, enchanting. Will Van Honsebrouck K8 ever be beaten, or will it retain its number 1 spot in the Beer Chart forever?
On first tasting La Trappe Trippel, it seemed it might even take over the number 1 spot in the chart. It didn't, but it's still one damn amazing beer. There is an emerging sweetness in the texture of La Trappe Tripel, and indeed the sweetness dominates the beer. There is a lot of caramel in the first taste, along with some yeastiness. There is a citrus fruitiness, and the alcohol content is immediately evident from the flavour. This explosion of flavour leads to a slight spice in the finish, sweet malt and some yeast. The head is frothy and undulating at first, but dissipates later on.
Like the taste, the bouquet of La Trappe Tripel is alive with character, containing candy, citrus fruit, spicy hops, and some cloves. A sweet, full-bodied beer, well deverved of the coveted number 2 spot in the chart.
It has a good head, forming a crown lacing. Caracole Ambree is a full-bodied, medium-sweet Belgian beer with sufficiently little carbonation to bring forth the amazing flavours. It is a clear beer, but does give the illusion of having a cloudy haze. The colour is an enchanting dark. This is one fantastic beer!
This amazingly tasty beer, Grolsch Winter Vorst, is actually vintage 2001 and thus no longer in production. If you're lucky, you'll find a bottle. Believe me, you'll want to buy it! It is a very sweet, medium-bodied Dutch beer, far superior, in my opinion, to everything else by Grolsch.
The nose is sweet fruit, malt, marzipan, almonds, along with some rum and raisins. It has a taste to die for - woody and spicy... sweet and malt... perhaps some peaches, plums and vanilla in there as well. Wow, this was fantastic!! It had a spicy, malty aftertaste. It has a mouthfeel that warms you up inside... slightly bittery, but not imposingly so (mainly on the palate). Also on the palate in the texture of Grolsch Winter Vorst is a hint of its strong alcohol content. It's so very easy to go down, bursting with flavours, with a wonderful foamy head. My only hope is that this beer undergoes another vintage in the future.
An incredible fruity beer from Belgium, Chapeau Gueuze is dark golden to mid-golden in colour. Its flavour is extremely fruity and smooth. Both these attributes emerge in the finish also. There is little to no sourness to this beer at all. Despite its premium strength, you could down a whole glass in a few gulps. Not that you'd want to. This is a beer to savour.
Chapeau Gueuze gives off an impressive fruit aroma. It has a decent head, which thins out but retains foamy streaks of lacing around the glass. Its texture is very smooth and fruit-filled. It is only a light-bodied beer with little carbonation, but it is the ultimate refresher.
It's refreshing to find an American beer in the Top 10. And what a great beer it is. The taste of Celis Pale Bock is of candy malt. Extreme candy malt. Sweet malt is in the finish. A taste of heaven. Absolutely fabulous!
The nose is malty with extreme candy. Very sweet. It has a candy texture and moderate carbonation. It has a smooth head of froth which leaves thick foamy lacing around the sides of the glass. Celis Pale Bock is like liquid caramel.
This Christmas version of the famous Belgian Bush beer has a smooth head with undulating bubbles and fantastic lacing. It is a mysterious dark golden in colour. Bush de Noel is a rich beer with a malty bouquet.
Full-bodied with a sweet taste, it is in the initial flavour of Bush de Noel where you can most sense the very high alcohol content. This strong flavour and malt emerges again in the finish. It is a lightly carbonated beer with a rich mouthfeel. Very rich! The malty, rich texture makes this a beer to die for. Despite the 12% ABV, it's not a difficult beer to drink.
Minty, with tangerines and other fruits, Biere du Boucanier Red Ale gives your taste buds a fruit, minty, malty flavour, all rolled into one, at the beginning. The discernable tangerine flavour continues into the finish, along with the fruit mintiness, maltiness and a delicate spice.
A medium-dry beer with a texture full of honey, slight bitteryness and delicate malt, Biere du Boucanier Red Ale is full-bodied with excellent head retainment - thick and undulating with foamy, thick lacing. A medium-gold beer with outstanding flavour and appearance, its aroma is no less impressive - honey, malt and delicate peach notes. A stunning recent addition to the Top 10 beer in our exhaustive Beer Chart.
Liefmans Gluhkriek is unique in all the world. It is a beer that you drink warm! The beer is designed in such a way that, if you apply heat to the bottle before opening and drinking, it actually improves the flavours of the beer! Gluhkriek is obviously a kriek beer, and thus has a texture of cherries. There are lots of cherries in the flavour, alongside a small measure of sourness. This sourness continues into the aftertaste, but remains very subdued.
Through the bubbly, quite foamy head emerges an aroma bursting with fruit. Liefmans Gluhkriek is a sweet beer with a moderate amount of body and little carbonation.
What a surprise it was when I found out that Stella Artois had manufactured its own bock beer! Far superior to its famous cousin, Artois Bock has a malty, sugar texture, sweet and spicy. A medium-bodied beer with a sweet, sugary taste with lots of caramel malt.
Artois Bock is spicy in the aftertaste, with lots of malt and some more unfermented sugar. It has moderate carbonation but retains an excellent head - thick and very foamy, leaving an attractive foamy crown lacing around the glass, which lasts. An extreme malty aroma with more spices. Overall, Artois Bock is a syrupy beer, and very easy to drink.
Sweet and chocolatey. Vondel is a dark beer, and I believe it's actually the dark version of the famous Lucifer beer. The chocolate becomes fruit in the aftertaste, and there is a strong aroma of dark fruits emanating through the smooth head of froth.
Vondel is a medium-bodied beer with a delightfully smooth texture to it. There is little fizz and a lot of unfermented sugar. This is a dark, mysterious beer, lesser known amongst the menagerie of globally available Belgian beers.
The Brune version of Val-Dieu has a rather doughy mouthfeel, thick on the tongue, with a lot of fizz. It is a full-bodied beer with an intense aroma containing fruit, yeast, spices, and caramel sugariness.
Val-Dieu Brune is very earthy in its first taste. There are some nuts in there, and even less bittery chocolate notes, but the flavour is more dominated by sweet malt and a distinct tartness. The tartness develops in the finish, alongside dark fruits and spices. Despite the sweetness of Val Dieu Brune, it is somewhat dry on the palate in the aftertaste, mainly due to a strong-ish alcohol flavour. There is a moderate amount of carbonation in this beer, and it retains an excellent head - smooth and undulating. A full-bodied beer that takes you to heaven.
De Dolle Brouwers Stille Nacht is a dark beer with heaps of character, which conceals its alcohol strengh well. It is very very sweet, which comes through especially early on in the tasting (while it's still cold) with a sugary maltiness. It is very citrussy, earthy and exudes a certain floral flavour at the very beginning. There are also some grapes and raisins in there in the foretaste.
Stille Nacht has fruit tones in its aftertaste, specifically apples and berries. Through the bubbly head emerges a sugary, spicy aroma, in which the alcohol content is most evident. It is a very sweet beer with a thick mouthfeel, medium carbonation and heaps of body. A palatable beer if there ever was one.
On pouring Traquair Jacobite Ale, it produces a thick, foamy, undulating head, eventually dissipating to leave thick laces around the sides of the glass. This is a beer to be proud to behold, with its strong, sweet corriander, toffee aroma, which also oozes cherries and raisins. It possess a thick, spicy texture, sweet and malty.
A full-bodied Scottish beer with little carbonation in the overall mouthfeel, there is however a burst of fizziness when it first hits the tongue. It has a sweet malt flavour with bitter herbs, leaving a fruity, alcohol-filled aftertaste. Traquair Jacobite is a heavenly beer with an overall woody feel to it.
Delightful dark golden beer with a moderate strength for a Belgian beer, Leroy Christmas has a candy sweet, caramel flavour. On first meeting the palate, some high carbonation is evident, which soon settles to leave a lot of liquorice, malt and a very small measure of honey flavour. This all leads to an extremely smooth aftertaste.
A candy, roast malt bouquet comes through the lasting head of froth of Leroy Christmas. The spicy aroma is also full of smooth caramel, apple-like fruit, woodiness and perhaps some grapes. It possesses a rather thick texture that somehow feels very clean and smooth. A fantastic, sweet, full-bodied Christmas beer from Flanders, that's sure to warm you up deep inside, with its heaps of liquorice character.
Almost like an alcoholic Ribena drink, and yet so much more, Lindemans Cassis is of a mid to dark red hue, with a smooth head that forms crown lacing around the glass. It is surprisingly medium-bodied, with moderate fizz, and is very sweet. Sweet blackberries dominate the flavour, finishing sweet and rather sour. There is a somewhat bitter note to the aftertaste, which also has a cleansing feel to it.
The mouthfell of Lindemans Cassis is smooth and fruity. You can sense the alcohol, low as it is, through the aroma, which contains lot of dark fruits. This is a high-ranking fruit beer of more character than you'd expect from a beer of its kind.
Outstanding, strong dark Belgian beer, Ciney Speciale can aptly be termed the big brother of the Ciney range of beers. At 9% ABV proof, it has a strong, rum bouquet, filled with raisins, currents and fruits, perhaps banana. It is indeed a sweet beer, with caramel in the taste, along with raisins and dark fruit. There is a measure of fizziness on first tasting Ciney Speciale.
That plethora of flavours in Ciney Speciale leads to a sweet-tasting finish. It is a full-bodied beer if there ever was one, with a lasting, frothy head. Surprisingly easy to drink, given its strength.
Fruity, with tons of blackberries, Timmermans Cassis even has some chocolate aspect to it in its aftertaste. It is a medium-bodied Belgian fruit beer that is very sweet. Its frothy head leaves bubbly lacing around the sides of the glass. Its appearance is of a mid red to dark golden colour.
The aroma of Timmermans Cassis fills the air with blackberries, along with heaps more fruit. Chocolate and fruit comprise the texture of this amazing beer. It does have some sour-ish, bitter tones to it, but overall, the sweet fruit dominates. It is easy to go down, and is one of the champions of all the world's beers. (Incidentally, it seems that the alcohol content has been reduced from 5 to 4 in recent years. Not sure why, as it was perfectly good as it was!)
Mongozo Banana is inevitably a fantastic South African beer. Straight away, it comes across as very sweet, with some surprising wheaty notes. The aftertaste is quite creamy. Bananas dominate the smell, along with a very small measure of wheat.
This Mongozo beer is medium-bodied and has a sweet, fruity texture. It is advertised on the battle as a fair trade beer. Either way, it's an impressive fruit beer.
The flavour of Campbell's Christmas beer is to die for! It is rich, with fruits and dark malt... delicately nutty with roasted malt and a hint of unexpected dryness at the very beginning. There is roasted malt and heaps of sugar in the aftertaste.
A medium-sweet, full-bodied beer, Campbell's Christmas gives out a bouquet of sherry, along with lots of other discernable things, like port, grapes and raisins. The smell is also delicately nutty and quite sweet. The head isn't much to speak off, quickly settling to a thin layer and then vanishing altogether. It has a caramel texture with a hint of bitterness. One of the best Christmas beers there is! Although Scottish, Campbell's Christmas is brewed mainly for the Belgian market.
Sweet chestnuts, spicy with notes of hop bitterness. Marrons de l'Ardeche is a rare, impressive beer. It is nutty in the aftertaste. A texture that is sweet and nutty on the palate... earthy and clean-tasting.
Bourganel Marrons de l'Ardeche has a bubbly head of froth that rather too quickly vanishes. The beer gives off a bouquet of vanilla, bitter malt and hops. Overall, this is a well balanced beer with notes of anaseed and paradoxical hints of dryness.
Bourgogne des Flandres is of a moderate alcohol strength and is very easy to drink. There is a lasting sweetness to its flavour. Dark and mysterious, malty, with undertones of oak.
It has an attractive head, leaving a crown lacing on the glass. Through this foam emerges a bouquet of brown sugar, candy, chocolate and yeast. It's a very rich aroma! A mellow, pleasant mouthfeel, and indeed a mellow, pleasant overall beer, with tones of grapes throughout. It's difficult to emphasise how incredibly tasty Bourgogne des Flandres really is!
Everything is perfect about Ginder Ale. The flavour is malty and spicy, as well as sugary and fruity (perhaps oranges?). Despite the sugariness, it does give the mouth a slight dry feeling in the foretaste. The malt progresses onto the aftertaste, where some delightful grapefruit comes into play.
It has a caramel, fruity smell to it, however the aroma also exudes fresh spices and a bit of citrus. Ginder Ale is a full-bodied Belgian beer with moderate sweetness overall, and lots of fizz. It's a refreshing beer, easy to go down, with a persistent, attractive head of froth - very smooth and creamy. A great beer from the Stella Artois brewery.
As its name suggests, Floris Chocolate has a profoundly chocolate flavour. However, it doesn't differ from other Floris beers in that it has a fruit aspect to it, along with honey. There is some honey in the finish, and it has a chocolate, honey sweet smell.
It doesn't have much body to it, and equally little carbonation. It's a sweet beer with a fruity, chocolatey texture and a smooth, bubbly head of froth. I personally think Floris Chocolate is a silky, creamy, quality beer, but sadly a lot of people who've tasted it don't agree.
I found this bottle in a small newsagents store (such as they are) in Amsterdam in 2001. For years, I thought it was actually from Russia, but I've only recently found out it's a French beer. I don't think Meteor Pravda is in production any more. It was a bit of a phenomenon in France in the mid-1990's, but dwindled out a couple of years later, mainly being sold in nightclubs and trendy bars. As such, it was rather a cult beer.
It terms of its taste, Meteor Pravda is very much vodka-flavoured. The sweetness comes to the fore upon first tasting it. It is very easy and smooth going down, with a bit of a fruity texture to it. The aroma is fantastic. Overall, it's just a great beer, and I was lucky to find it. Truly revolutionary!
A wee-heavy Belgian beer of immense character, Huyghe McGregor is a whisky beer. Its flavour is very malty and sweet, with hints of smokiness, and even burntness. This leads to a very sweet finish. It has a head that lasts - very bubbly and thick to begin with, later turning into a mousse-like ring around the edges.
The nose is fruity (apples?... strawberries?) Sweet port is very evident there too, along with vanilla, some malt, and even less smokiness. It has a sweet, earthy mouthfeel. Overall, a very sweet, full-bodied beer, with caramel tones throughout. Wow!
Perhaps the fall of Silly Saison far from its original position in the Top 10 is unjustified, as it's such a great beer. There are notes of oak and unimposing sourness in its initial taste. It is rich, and sweet, and malty. Caramel with roasted malt. Toffee prunes and a tart apple feel to its flavour.
In the finish, it fully retains its maltiness, along with yeast notes, earthyness and a wine-like character. Through the solid, undulating, smooth head of froth emerges an extreme caramel aroma, slighly sour, but very malty, with fruity bread. Silly Saison is a dark, to dark golden beer, and its thick head lasts from start to finish. A full-bodied, moderately carbonated saison-style beer with a spicy, yeasty texture. Somewhat sharp, but overall very well balanced.
This fanstastic, strong, English beer immediately imposes a sugary sweetness on the palate, along with a certain yeastiness there too. Newcastle Star is the big brother of the famous Newcastle Brown Ale. It develops some buttery notes in its flavour later on during the tasting, with a very sugary aftertaste. It is most certainly in the aftertaste where the alcohol strength is most noticeable.
Newcastle Star is a medium-bodied, extremely sweet and sugary beer throughout, with a foamy, persistent head of froth that forms thick, foamy layered lacing around the glass. It gives out a bouquet of sweet malt, alcohol spice, yeast and butterscotch. Nectar of the gods, rich and flavoury. Great for a sweet tooth like mine.
Fischer Tradition is more or less the "standard", flagship beer of France's Fischer brewery. Like all of Fischer's beers, Tradition is dominated by fruit flavours, and is absolutely gorgeous. There are lots of oranges in the flavour. In the first taste, they are accompanied by some fizz. It keeps a decent head, which turns to patches, leaving patchy lacing around the glass. The aroma is profoundly fruit, especially oranges. It has a very clean, refreshing mouthfeel, with just enough carbonation to keep it exciting. A very fruity texture indeed.
A medium-bodied beer, Fischer Tradition is characterised by moderate dryness in the mouth. It has a citrus aspect to it, along with, perhaps, some lime tones. This is an amazingly refreshing beer!