Uklar gul med lett hvitt skum som daler fort og legger seg rundt kanten. Aroma hvetemalt banan sitrus humle. Smak hvetemalt krydder gjær sitrus humle banan. Fin fylde, frisk og fruktig. Flaske kjøpt på Bryggeri 13

Uklar gul med lett hvitt skum som daler fort og legger seg rundt kanten. Aroma hvetemalt banan sitrus humle. Smak hvetemalt krydder gjær sitrus humle banan. Fin fylde, frisk og fruktig. Flaske kjøpt på Bryggeri 13

330ml bottle from Beers of Europe - Cloudy yellow body, little rim of white foam. Nose is quite grassy, herbal, with a little note of clove and coriander. Taste is let down by a watery mouthfeel, not a great vehicle for some very light citrus and herby characters. Would never imagine this to be a 5.0% ABV beer.

330 ml bottle, from Gulating Ølutsalg, Stavanger. ABV is 4.7%. Hazy and very pale straw colour, small white head. Moderate aroma of wheat and citrus, some weak floral notes, only a hint of coriander. Citric mouthfeel, moderate carbonation, light bodied. Flavour of wheat and citrus, hardly any coriander, minimal hops. Refreshing, but not a great witbier.

I couldn’t wait to try this, it was in a much more appealing bottle than the one shown. This was a shorter bottle and it was clear, looks like fun. For a clear bottle, it had a pretty good mild sweet fruit aroma, must be fresh? Sediment on the bottom but stuck and poured clear pale. Initial slight processed impression but that fades and a wheaty gentle beer remains. A little citrus lemon zest hidden in the background. Yea, not bad, yields an almost ginger ale like attitude. Initially I thought it was goes to be just another medium rude wheat ale but certainly is refined enough to be called a witbier.

French witbier with moussy, creamily lacing, egg-white head with medium retention and hazy pale straw blonde colour with notable greenish hue; the equal haze is perturbed by strings of vivid fizz here and there. Aroma of industrial - not sharp - lemon juice or even lemon-scented air freshener, soap, starfruit, bread dough, lime cake, fresh sorrel, faint banana, unripe gooseberries, clear coriander, Conférence pear, sourish grains. Fruity, crisp onset, somewhat ’clean’ but still with vivid impressions of starfruit, unripe pear and some gooseberry, softly sourish with a sweetish touch, quite spritzy carbonation well fit for the style but calming down quickly, soft and rounded, smooth but somewhat thinnish mouthfeel. The sourishness, combining a dim, basic soapy sourishness of wheat with a sharper, more pronounced lime-like acidity, makes for a very refreshing mouthfeel, with a lot of retronasal soft lime juice or sweetened, almost hand soap-like lemon aroma; the soapiness is further accentuated by the coriander, as is to be expected from the style. Goes down as soapy as it began, with this soft ’industrial’ lemony touch dominating the finish and, frankly, becoming a bit tiresome in the end. Not bad per se, lacks a bit in malty breadiness perhaps, but it has an outspoken lime-like quality which, though feeling a bit ’fake’, lends it a fresh character which is easy to appreciate. Simple and straightforward for sure, but different from the old Hoegaarden standard. However: it says a lot that the brewer himself recommends throwing a slice of lemon in it - something a Belgian witbier brewer would never do - and that this style, which has become a bit outdated in its country of origin, still remains fairly popular in France. It is cristal clear to me that France still has a long way to go in order to produce really interesting beers; there is a lot of hobby brewing going on throughout the country but they seem to be stuck in Belgian clichés rather than trying to experiment and find something new. Of course, copying 20th century Belgian ale standards is exactly how the beer revolution in e.g. Italy or the Netherlands started - but that was in the eighties and nineties... Let us hope that French brewers are willing to draw from the rich wine culture of their country and find ways to incorporate that know-how into their beers, like the Italians have done - then France may one day become a truly interesting beer country.