De Garre, a stone’s-throw from the market square in Bruges, comes across nonetheless as being aimed more at locals than tourists. The menu is in ‘Nederlandse’ only, for one thing. That’s not to say it’s unwelcoming for English speakers or tourists, though.
De Garre tripel is the house brew. It’s a very spicy, alcohol-fuming beer which was almost too boozy and raw, but very welcome on a stormy night.
We also took the opportunity to complete the Struise cannon with Rosse which was, sadly, a bit of a dud — sweet rather than spicy and with a vaguely cardboard-y off flavour.
Round three included Deugniet, which tasted like lemon barley, and Hopus from Lefebvre. Hopus is advertised widely and comes with a very elaborate presentation — the beer is in a tall stem glass, the dregs in a shot glass, with a stern warning from the waiter that the yeast is ‘powerful’ and might ‘mess you up’. It tasted a lot like a cask ale, maybe because of the bottle-conditioning and the earthy yeast flavours. From something at 7.5%, however, you expect more than to be reminded of a 4% British session ale.
6 replies on “De Garre, Bruges”
All that glisters is not gold?
Hopus. What a gimmicky beer….
Great bar. Better than Brugs Beertje, we thought.
PF and Tandleman — the funny thing is, we only ordered it because we were hoping it would be hoppy! We were a bit startled then when the serving ceremony began. Definitely a case of style over content.
TIW — didn’t get to Brugs Beertje this time. In fact, I’m not even sure it was on our list.
I recall a round of Hopi at A La Mort Subite last year and there were no shot glasses involved. Perhaps we was robbed.
[…] Of course, the beer tasted fine (if yeasty…) and, no, it didn’t make us ill. Nor did a shot of yeast sediment from a bottle of Hopus in Bruges for that matter. […]