Bottle at De Heeren van Liedekercke, shared with Anke and Pieter.
Pours hazy yellow/ochre with a foamy, white head. The aroma contains bitter & fruity hops, flowers, spices, yeast, grapefruit, herbs, grass and banana. It tastes light flowery sweet and medium hoppy bitter; bit dry and spicy finish. Medium body, slick texture, fizzy to soft carbonation. Nice, flowery aroma; just the right amount of bitterness and enough yeast to balance it all. A very good Belgian IPA!

Imported from my RateBeer account as d'Oude Maalderij Homo Beerectus 03: Hop Hanker Sorachi Ace (by d'Oude Maalderij):
Aroma: 8/10, Appearance: 4/5, Taste: 7/10, Palate: 4/5, Overall: 16/20, MyTotalScore: 3.9/5

7/VIII/17 - 33cl bottle from Bierhalle Deconinck (Vichte) @ home - BB: 30/IV/17 (2017-1180)

Clear orange beer, big solid creamy yellowish head, pretty stable, non adhesive. Aroma: pretty fruity, lychee, kiwi, pretty floral, some goose berries, bit of citrus. MF: soft carbon, medium body, creamy texture. Taste: bit sweet, pretty fruity, bit funky, nice yet very gentle bitterness, sweet malts, some banana peel, caramel. Aftertaste: more floral notes, soapy bitterness, some berries, bit smoky even, malty, banana peel, some alcohol, sweet touch, bit resinous, bitter and dry finish, very interesting to have a (Belgian) Single Hop Sorachi Ace! Looking forward to the other 5 hops!

330 ml. Bottle @ Beerlovers Bar. Bottled 30-04-2017. Special made cap, cool. 3rd entry into the 30 beer series whose overall concept still confuses me a bit. Apparently this is the start of a 6 beer single hop series within the series. Conceptually this reminds me of the mess that the “Teargarden by Kaleidyscope” project by The Smashing Pumpkins became. First time that I hear of Belgian Sorachi Ace hop, this is apparently also the first time that it was grown in Belgium. Deep hazy orange, uneven collapsing white head. Nose is mellow orange peel & peel, very un-Sorachi Ace-like, malt base is quite big for what it is plenty of caramel malt base. Taste is quite malt base forward, big caramel, dough, bread, toffee, finish is hop which is weirdly medicinal & green, Sorachi Ace is all weird, medicinal, floral green & not that big in profile. Body is malty, caramel, low medicinal, faintly milky yeast. The base is good & this is very clearly the best beer so far in the series but the hop is rather odd & Sorachi Ace is my favourite hop, could use more hop & maybe bit less weirdness. Bottle uses the tuned town appearance of Sorachi Ace as a selling point given people’s difficult relationship with this hop variety.

Bottle at beerlovers bar. Pours darker, unclear blonde. Smell is intense sorachi (yoghurt, milky, peach ) taste is more balanced. Decent bitterness, creamy, hoppy, sorachi. Better than expected from the scent.

The third Homo Beerectus, a series that will encompass thirty beers in total, this one a Belgian IPA single-hopped with Sorachi Ace, the high profile hop variety developed by Sapporo in 1984, widely acclaimed for its unique character. The whole project is detailed on their website, involving a rather mysterious and confusing story about this Homo Beerectus concept - a story I’m not going to bother reading anymore. Thick, regularly shaped, egg-white head, settling in a dense moussy rim and a pattern of flat islands in the middle, crowning a hazy, bright peach blonde beer with deep orange hue. Aroma of dried orange peel, kumquat, warm cake, dried dill as is typical for Sorachi Ace but also dried basil, banana, pineapple, lightly toasted white bread, crushed pink peppercorns, watermelon, baking powder, horseradish, old ginger powder, grapefruit zest, straw, cloves, hints of meringue, strawberry and tonic water. Mellow, juicy onset, softish carbonation (perhaps even a bit undercarbonated), restrained fruity esters with hints of apricot, pear, melon and some green banana, smooth and slick mouthfeel. Lightly biscuity and cereally, supple malt body with a thin edge of toasted bread, on which the mild fruity tones surf towards an elegantly drying finish, where the Sorachi Ace features shine more brightly than I was expecting, though still ’interfered’ by some yeasty phenols; I do, however, get retronasal impressions of withering dill and citrus peel, even something vaguely lychee-like. ’Cleanly earthy’, spicy, bit dusty and rooty, even somewhat ’glueish’ bitterness at the back of the mouth, but nothing overly harsh as is often the case in ’Belgian IPAs’ gone too far in their hop-forward enthusiasm; remains juicy, elegant and fruity, with a powdery yeast feel to it especially after the sediment has been added. Considering the two previous beers in this series, I must honestly admit that my expectations for this were not too high and I can already hear more internationally oriented hopheads remark that the Sorachi Ace could have been applied even more ’cleanly’ and expressively, but its unmistakable properties are there, and the esteriness has been kept sufficiently at bay so as not to interfere with it too much. Still yeasty enough to be called a ’Belgian IPA’ rather than a true ’international IPA’, that much is very clear, but within that segment, this is well among the best examples I had so far, as well as being the best Oude Maalderij beer so far in my humble opinion. Very elegant one Jef, cheers!