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I was happy to see a bottle of Petrus on the shelf recently, even though I wasn’t familiar with this particular beer with the odd name Rood Bruin.
Petrus is a line of sour ales from Brouwerij De Brabandere of Belgium.

Rood Bruin is a blend of 67 percent young brown beer and 33 percent of what the brewery calls “foederbeer,” which is a pale ale aged for two years in foeders (pronounced fooder), large oak barrels. The pale ale sours in the oak barrels.
It pours a lovely chestnut reddish-brown with a nice creamy layer of foam. 

The label indicates this beer rates a 3 out of 5 on the brewery’s sour scale, so I prepare myself for the pucker. But, it’s not there. I would rate this more of a 1 on a scale of sourness going to 5. 

It’s a very mild sour with what I believe is a hint of crystal maltiness. There is also a slight spiciness that I am going to guess is the Saaz hops coming through. 

And I just realized I have had this beer before when it was sold under a different name, Oud Bruin, which means old brown. I believe “rood” means red, so I guess the brewery decided that Red Brown sounds better than Old Brown. Plus, oud bruin is a traditional style of Flemish beer, so the name change sets it apart from all the oud bruins out there.

At 5.5 percent, it’s an easy drinking brown, one I would love to have fresh from a tap in West Flanders some day. 

Better yet, I’d love to try a blend of 67 aged pale ale and 33 percent young brown ale to bring the sourness more to the front, but also fresh from a tap in Belgium rather than a bottle I found on a shelf in a Wisconsin bottle shop. Oh, well, dreaming is still legal.