33cl bottle for 0,75 € from Lidl supermarket (Rue Gray, Ixelles) in Brussels. F: medium, dark tan, quick gone. C: brown to coppery, clear. A: malty, caramel, chemical fruity, hint of Coca-Cola, vaguely candy fruity, bit herbal. T: something artificial sweet, vaguely fruity, caramel artificial, this is even worse than blonde version, really cheap chemical feeling, medium body and carbonation, cheap rate for me but who can really drink this?

Bottle from Lidl, Bruges. Pours clear copper with a lasting, small, unstable, tan head; little lacing. Aroma of caramel, candi sugar, industrial pancake syrup, cookie dough, energy drink (RedBull), soggy brown bread, vague medicin, caramelised popcorn, winegums. Taste is medium to heavy sugary sweet, pure caramel & syrup with more sugar on top, very industrial & candy-like; 'countered' - so to speak - by a very light spicy bitterness that has faint licorice, herbs & medicin (Coca-Cola's secret spices or something like that?). Very sugary finish, caramel, vague herbal hops, some brown rum-like alcohol. Medium body, syrupy texture, lively carbonation. Simply put, this is bad, but what irritates me the most is that disgusting marketing text on the bottle labeling this as an 'authentic' beer (and indeed, the fact that no brewer is mentioned).

The dark counterpart of Archivist Blond, and as with the blonde one, I hesitated to add it here because Lidl refused to reveal where they have this beer made - something I thoroughly hate, as I find this kind of anal attitude an insult to anyone who is being passionate about beer in general. Then someone did add it anyway apparently, so I looked up my rating from several weeks ago and decided to enter it here, if reluctantly so. Bottle from the Lidl supermarket at Einde Were in Ghent. Large- but even-bubbled, medium thick, pale beige-ish white, mousy head over a cristal clear, bronze-hued copper coloured robe showing fine strings of sparkling. Aroma of Industrial caramel syrup (probably an actual ingredient - meanwhile proven to be carcinogenic in large quantities, by the way), Coca-Cola, baking soda, muesli, corn, rubber, cookie dough, bland caramel candy, cane sugar, vague iron. Sweet onset, 'brown' (but actually white) sugariness with a lot of caramel flavour in an artificial way, yet no explicit fruitiness; somewhat cloying sweetness, mitigated by fizzy and stinging carbonation, moves along quietly over a slick cereally, corny and artificially 'caramelized' middle towards a finish where more plaster- and rubber-like notes appear, as well as a background touch of generic grassy hops providing little, yet admittedly noticeable and welcoming bitterness. Lidl's version of Leffe Brune or Grimbergen Dubbel - or even direct competitor Aldi's Abij van 't Park Bruin, this, like its blonde sister, is a beer as unambitious in its style as it gets - this kind of caramel-flavoured, pasteurized, 'dead' strong lagers is an insult to 'real' Belgian dubbel. But I probably shouldn't act this surprised, I knew what I had coming when I spotted this bottle on the shelves, of course. Points off for this being Lidl taking me for an idiot and refusing to disclose the brewery where it's made - but as with the blonde, my bet is on Martens in Belgian Limburg, the dedicated supplier of bland and soulless 'dead' cliché beers to many a supermarket chain in Belgium and abroad.