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

One of these Culminante beers brewed at Hofbrouwerijke in Flanders for a client brewer in the Eupen-Malmedy region, a hybrid of saison and IPA - claimed to be an original find, but in fact this has been done before many times, albeit not very often in Belgium, admittedly. Snow white, hugely foamy, dense, pillowy, paper-like lacing head over a misty pale yellow blonde robe with greenish tinge and lots of fierce sparkling rushing through. Aroma initially lightstruck ('cat pee') but this eventually fades as usual, unveiling impressions of wormwood leaf, spiced crackers, green banana, grass, bitterroot, white pepper, sawdust, old dried grapefruit peel. Dryish onset, green pear and green banana notes but low in both esters and sweetness, medium carbonated (soft yet still very active) with smooth pale malt core, grainy and dry, the dryness accentuated by a long, wormwoody, rooty hop bitterness. This bitterness becomes tonic water-like and dries the throat, but forgets to bring the range of retronasal aromas one tends to expect nowadays from anything with the term 'IPA' written on it. Much more a (very) bitter blonde than anything IPA-like, or again one of those beers lagging behind on international trends and still thinking that 'IPA' means 'more hop bitter than normal'... As for the saison part: ever since the craft beer movement 'discovered' this term, it has been applied to a whole range of blonde Belgian style ales indiscriminately and I fear exactly that has happened in this case as well. Decent dry quencher, technically well executed, but neither a true IPA nor a true saison for me.