Browse Tag

belgium

Good & careless

[triple]Het Anker “Gouden Carolus” “Ambrio 1471” Amber Ale (Belgium) – Dark, but not overly so, with a rich, brown baritone of spice and dried fruit. Perfectly balanced, and really, really good. (1/08)

Het Anker “Gouden Carolus” “Classic” Brown Ale (Belgium) – Simultaneously lighter and heavier than the Ambrio, showing dried, yeasty stone fruit/citrus and gentle but fulfilling waves of spicy complexity. Brilliant. Compared to the Ambrio, it’s better but less exciting, if that makes any sense. (1/08)

Het Anker “Gouden Carolus” Triple Ale (Belgium) – Concentrated, with dark, aged-sugar thickness, firm palate intensity, and a really beautiful, measured combination of complexity, structure, and power. Terrific. (1/08)

Happy bergen

[label]Alken-Mas “Grimbergen” Blonde Ale (Belgium) – Fun, malty, fruity. A bit lactic and then finishing a bit sweeter than I’d like. In this style and for this price, Leffe is clearly superior. (1/08)

Triple jump

[label]Maredsous “10” Triple Abbey Ale (Belgium) – Intense, plumy and spicy, with the fat sweetness one expects, braced by power (mostly alcohol) and length. Good, perhaps very good, but not particularly special. Still, it disappears quickly, which says something. (1/08)

Maredsous, single Sue

[label]Maredsous “8” Dubbel Abbey Ale (Belgium) – Strident and disappointing, with spiced apple winding up for a big pitch, and then simply falling flat on its face. An alcohol-delivery mechanism (and a lot of it), but little more. (1/08)

Chouffe off

[rotating chouffes]La Chouffe Golden Ale (Belgium) – Classic Belgian spice, wheat and old golden apples, with a powdery undercurrent and a fine, aggressive finish. Terrific. (12/07)

La Chouffe “Mc Chouffe” Brown Ale (Belgium) – Bronzed wheat, spice, froth and texture with a bitter, coffee-like sheen…not too much, though. However, the finish is a little bit on the watery side. (12/07)

La Chouffe Dobbelen IPA Tripel “Houblan” (Belgium) – Intense and heavy creamed spice, molten iron, and caramelized apple. Very dense, but despite all that weight it finishes slightly short. Still quite good, nonetheless. (12/07)

TN: Grim & brown

[logo]Grimbergen “Optimo Bruno” (Belgium) – Dark, roasted and heavily spiced, with an espresso cream backbone that almost edges towards root beer. Brewed and blackened complexity. (5/07)

TN: Ale, ale, the gang’s all here

[label]de Block “Satan” Red Ale (Belgium) – Deep brick-dried spice, fresh clay, a pleasant layer of hoppy dryness, and the memory of red cherries and apple seed. A complete, sophisticated brew. Delicious. (5/07)

de Block “Special Block 6” Blonde Ale (Belgium) – Spicy/fruity and suggestive of fat, but the actual experience is lively and fun. Perhaps even a bit goofy. This brew shouldn’t be over-intellectualized, but it should most definitely be enjoyed. (5/07)

de Block “Dendermonde” Abbey Ale (Belgium) – Weighty and cream-textured, with spice and lees dominating, yet surprisingly light on the finish. Balanced and fresh, which is not necessarily typical for an abbey ale. I’m not even sure it’s desirable, to be honest, but it’s a good beer, no matter what. (5/07)

Port “Lost & Found” Abbey Ale “The Lost Abbey” (California) – Sprightly for an abbey, but with all the spicy/leesy complexity one would want, here dominated by banana skins and strong yeastiness. It’s just the faintest bit watery, especially on the finish, but otherwise a very solid exemplar of the style. (5/07)

Unibroue Blanche de Chambly (Québec) – This is the worst example of this I’ve ever tasted…thin, insufficiently aromatic, and insufficiently interesting. Maybe it’s corked, though I don’t get the telltale aroma. (5/07)

Chimay “Première” Ale (Belgium) – Solid and dependable, but getting a bit boring, with frothy background to a featureless foreground. There’s spice, there’s texture, there’s weight, but – as the beer-swilling kids say – there’s not a lot of “there” there. What’s going on with this stuff? Or is it just impossible to rely on the lower-tier bottlings? (5/07)

TN: Beer me

[bottle]Avery “The Reverend” Belgian-Style Quadrupel Ale (Colorado) – This is outstanding. Weight and intensity married, with enough thick, bracing, spiced stone fruit to carry the alcohol. It’s a powerful brew, but it’s complete and polished in every respect…a terrific exemplar of the style, and most likely the best I’ve ever had from a domestic brewery. (3/07)

Avery “Hog Heaven” Barleywine-Style Ale (Colorado) – Dark, thick and Scotch-like, with toasted old wood, French press coffee, baked plum and cherry stems leading to a malty, but round and mouth-filling finish. Nicely executed, and very polished. (3/07)

Rock Art “Ridge Runner” Barley Wine Ale (Vermont) – The aroma keeps sending me back to the label to make sure this isn’t a lager. Strange. There’s palate-deadening weight, bringing with it dried espresso residue and an old maple-syrup wash, but everything’s a bit hollow. (3/07)

d’Achouffe “La Chouffe” Belgian Golden Ale with Spices (Belgium) – Light in every respect, as if pushed through a filter, except one: the alcohol, which sticks out to an unpleasant degree. There needs to be more intensity if it’s going to carry that much burn. (3/07)

Dupont “Foret” Organic Saison Ale (Belgium) – Bright and summery, showing a good weight and pleasantly abrading hops. It finishes a little flat, though, like stale pre-ground white pepper. (3/07)

Le Baladin “Wayan” Saison Style Ale with Spices (Italy) – Hoppy and crisp, with unintegrated spice notes and a firm, monotone core that feels more like a Trappist than a saison. Despite being a little odd, it’s reasonably tasty. (3/07)

TN: Brew moon

[label]Unibroue “La Fin du Monde” (Québec) – Rich, redolent and spicy, with a creamy old stone fruit texture and moderate, tingly sweetness. There’s a vague metallic edge that I don’t recall from this beer in the past. The first sign of decline under the new megacorporate regime, or just a momentary lapse? I guess we’ll see. (3/07)

Unibroue “Éphémère” (black currant) (Québec) – This different-every-year brew is usually interesting, but this is a particularly tasty variation. Think of it as a sort of half-heated imitation of a lambic, with the fruit more obviously added rather than integrated, but not possessing the irritating sweetness that ruins so many fruit-enhanced brews. Instead, there’s a good crispness that lends a sour-toned balance to the beer. (3/07)

Brasserie du Bocq Blanche de Namur (Belgium) – Spiced and thready, with a detergent froth of spice and white plum. A little more “flavored” than these things can sometimes be, but certainly a fine exemplar of the style. (3/07)

TN: The von Trappist family

[cap]Trappistes Rochefort 6 (Belgium) – 7.5% alcohol. Solid Belgian ale flavors of rich stone fruit, spice and distant caramel with a nice froth and a little balancing bitterness. But it finishes very insubstantially, and since the far-superior 8 is the same price… (2/07)

[cap]Trappistes Rochefort 8 (Belgium) – 9.2% alcohol. A terrific ale, balanced between the fresh-but-redolent style of young Trappist ale and the deep, dessert-like smoked brown candy of the higher-end versions. The palate runs the gamut from fruit to cake spice, with excellent weight and substance. The only distraction is the carbonation, which is a little aggressive. Still, this is my favorite of the 6/8/10 trio. (2/07)

[cap]Trappistes Rochefort 10 (Belgium) – 11.3% alcohol. Dark hickory and Christmas pudding with swirling notes of a Moroccan spice bazaar. It’s a hefty, solid beer, with perhaps more force and less grace than it might ideally possess. And the alcohol does stick out a bit. (2/07)