Bottle picked up from a Wine Shop on the southern edge of Lake Garda and consumed at Camping Schwarzsee, Nr Kitzbühel, Friday 4th October 2019. Pours hazy light gold with a white head, a little gooseberry on the nose along with some pear drops and honey. Taste is ok but too sweet, a little rough around the edges with the honey and some malt. It's ok.

Bottle from Bierenplezier in Almere. I first thought this was from Ducato, seeing the shape of the bottle, but it turns out to be a totally different Italian craft brewery I never heard of. Irregular, fairly loose and bubbly, egg-white head retaining as a moussy rim on the edges and in thin veils of tiny bubbles in the middle, over a hazy peach blonde beer with ochre hue. Aroma of overripe gooseberry, banana, honey, sorrel, mandarin, buttermilk, sourdough, yellow kiwi, limoncello, ripe pear, white bread dough, sweet dessert wine, gin, bubblegum, damp straw, powder sugar, apricot, pineapple but also some vague melting plastic. Fruity, sweetish onset, residual white candi sugar syrup, impressions of strong banana isoamylacetate, strong pear, hints of gooseberry, melon and orange, with sweetness dominating the sourishness, spritzy carbo but fit for the style. Supple, full mouthfeel, bready and honeyish malt sweet body while esters continue and spicy phenols come in retronasally. Malt sweetness persists in the finish but meets a ’friendly’ hop bitterness there, earthy, floral and leafy, with peppery notes, drying a little bit; still the white candi sugar wins in the end, even a tad cloying, countered more by a glow of warming, gin-like alcohol than by hop bitterness; this alcohol effect even becomes a little bit wry and fatiguing in the end. Clove-like phenolic notes join the floral hops and fruity esters retronasally. Clearly the intention here was to imitate ’edelbier’ - that is to say, the near-imaginary substyle of strong Belgian blonde built around the unsurpassable Duvel but in practice nearly indistinguishable from tripel. Strong in isoamylacetate (banana ester), pear-like, spritzy, relatively lightly malty, fruity and alcoholic but still highly drinkable, I’d say their attempt at making a ’Duveloid’ came out quite successfully, but it does not beat the real thing, like most of the Belgian attempts from competing breweries. Too sweet and banana-like for my personal taste, but that being said: if the aim was to brew a strong blonde in the most Belgian way possible, mission accomplished, I would never have associated this with Italian craft.

Hazy medium amber colour, small frothy white head, mostly diminishing, light lacing. Aroma pale malts, fruity (peach, pear, orange), light honey, candy sugar. Taste medium sweet and slightly bitter, fruity, white grapes, alcohol, with average to long duration, sweetbitter finish, light dusty notes. Medium body, oily texture, soft carbonation, fresh and fruity lady but not completely convincing.

33cl Bottle at Bar Baarsch. Murky golden colour, white head. Aroma of honey, pear, yeast, sweet malts, fruits. Flavour is sweet, malty, fruity, white fruits, honey, yeast, bittersweet finish, some floral notes. Medium-bodied. Nice enough beer.

(Draught at In de Wildeman, Amsterdam, 26 Feb 2014) Golden colour with frothy, white head. Fruity, malty nose with notes of white bread, peaches, hay and tropical fruit. Malty, fruity taste with peaches, dried pineapple, mango, candy sugar and a balanced grassy bitterness. Almost full body, with a certain sweetness. On the sweet side, but quite tasty. Nice one.

Draught @ In de Wildeman. Hazy pale yellow color, small white head. Smell and taste lightly malts, grapes, a hint of apple, some sweetness. Hmm ok beer.

Draft at In De Wildeman. Pours cloudy golden with an off white head. Aroma of floral hops, sweet malt, grapes, fruit. Flavour is moderate sweet and light moderate bitter. Medium bodied with light carbonation.