7.3

Appearance - 7 | Aroma - 7.5 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 7 | Overall - 7.5

One of the original two beers - meanwhile joined by an IPA - by this small 'bierfirma' in the German speaking part of Belgium, brewing at a nearby microbrewery which I guess is equally obscure to most non-regional beer drinkers as this bierfirma itself. Longneck bottle from a local supermarket in Amel. Thin and open, off-white, tiny-bubbled ring of foam over a near-hazy, peach blonde robe with pale orange glow (but not truly amber). Aroma of old dried orange peel, rusk, dry biscuit, dried thyme, shrivelled autumn apples, radish peel, touch of sulphur. Crisp, lightly sweetish onset, rather clean apart from vague apple peel and kumquat notes, moderately carbonated with slick mouthfeel; biscuity, rusk-like maltiness, cereally in their core with a herbal, thyme-like hop bitter note on top as well as a retronasal whiff of clove-like phenols. The hop bitterness retains balance with the sweetishness of the malts so everything ends pleasantly harmonious, if clean and sleek. Walloon 'ambrée' but a bit cleaner and less yeasty than most of its kind, and in that sense very close to the old 'spéciale belge'.