Bouteille 50cl, BB 09/2023, batch# B33 blend 2.
Pâle/ambrée, col fin blanc-cassé.
Arôme sur un bouquet bien belge avec de fins esters fruité clairement axé sur le triple. En rétro-nasal, je note un côté fruité noir - figues et dattes, léger boisé du Bourbon apportant un léger nez vanillé. Le volet alcoolisé reste cependant assez dominant. A cela s'ajoute tout de même un fini de sucre-résiduel qui perdure.
Palais marque bien le côté alcool de cette version, le tout gardant tout de même une approche très belge reprise à la Big Nose. Pointe de pomme caramélisée, chaleur résiduelle venant du Bourbon avec ce côté whiskey qui est assez dominant. Frutis secs et confits - raisins/figues, et léger sucre résiduel qui perdure tout au long.

0.5l bottle. Orange body with a thin and quickly disappearing white head. Bold bourbon and oak notes in the aroma with nutmeg, booze and some orange zest. Taste of oak, booze, orange zest and burnt sugar. The barrel character is a bit too much for me, to be honest. Medium body and low carbonation. Ok, especially if you're into the taste of oak.

NovaBirra’s Big Nose, a dry-hopped tripel, aged on barrels that previously contained August 17th, a Walloon whisky brand from the province of Namur; part of a new series of Belgian specialty beers issued by Emanuele Corazzini’s ‘bierfirma’. Mousy, regularly shaped, medium thick, pale greyish off-white head breaking quickly in the middle but still well-retaining considering the alcohol, warm and deep amberish-tinged ‘cognac’ orange blonde robe, lightly hazy at first but misty with sediment. Aroma strongly dominated by booze (indeed clear and pure whisky but brandy-like as well), almond or even marzipan, honey liqueur, canned peach, orange zest, vanilla-like oak wood (strong!), strawberry, pineapple, black pepper, biscuit cake, vague hint of fried egg. Sweet onset, yellow raisins, candied fig and candied orange, touch pineapple, medium carb, light sourish edge; smooth, bit resinous, deeply caramelly malt middle, biscuity too, tad peanutty perhaps with a very thin toasty edge, quickly soaked in evidently strongly whisky-like alcohol, colouring the finishing stage completely with peppery alcohol heat and outspoken whisky flavour; meanwhile the vanilla effects of the oak wood shine through retronasally and very explicitly so, while malt and hops contribute to a soft end bitterness, which is largely overruled by the wryness and heat of the booze. Woody tannins and candied orange sweetness, along with honeyish residual sugariness, linger through this whisky effect. Bold and powerful winter warmer, a Belgian barleywine of sorts (not unlike Dubuisson’s Bush Prestige, for example) with an inviting though utterly boozy nose, ‘bigger’ than actual Big Nose indeed, but perhaps a tad too alcoholic in the end for me personally.