Cantillon Iris
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Tasting Notes
Cantillon Iris is an unblended lambic dry-hopped with aged hops, which gives it a character quite distinct from gueuze or kriek — the nose carries earthy, musty funk alongside faint floral and grassy hop notes that have nothing to do with bitterness. On the palate, it's bracingly tart with lemon pith, green apple, and a damp cellar quality, backed by a dry, almost tannic finish. The body is lean and bone-dry, as lambic tends to be, with carbonation that's modest rather than effervescent. It lingers with a clean acidity that doesn't fade fast.
About the Brewery
Cantillon is a Brussels-based brewery and working museum operating out of the same building since 1900, and it remains one of the last traditional lambic producers in the Senne Valley. They ferment exclusively with wild, ambient yeast and bacteria — no cultivated strains — and age their beer in old wine and port barrels. Their lineup is small, seasonal, and frequently allocated, making bottles like Iris genuinely hard to source outside of the brewery itself.
Food Pairings
The sharp acidity and earthy funk here work well with aged hard cheeses like Comté or aged Gouda, where the fat cuts the tartness and the funk mirrors the cheese's depth. Oysters on the half shell are a natural match because the briny minerality and the beer's leanness reinforce each other without either dominating. Charcuterie — particularly cured meats with some fat like jambon de Bayonne — holds up to the acidity and bridges the earthiness. Sourdough bread with cultured butter plays into the shared fermentation character in a way that feels deliberate rather than accidental.
Style Guide
Unblended lambic is spontaneously fermented beer — meaning it relies entirely on wild yeast and bacteria present in the air rather than any pitched culture — and is served or bottled from a single barrel without the blending process used to make gueuze. It tends to be flat or nearly so, intensely sour, and highly variable from barrel to barrel, which is part of the point. Lambic originates in the Pajottenland region southwest of Brussels and the city itself, where the local microbial environment is considered essential to the process. Where gueuze blends young and old lambic to create carbonation and complexity, unblended lambic is rawer and more austere — closer to what comes straight out of the barrel.