Den 12 / Den Twaalf

Murky light brown pour. Has a sweet, sugary aroma. Flavour is full of candy sweetness. A bit of a sugar bomb.

33cl Bottle from Prik&Tik Baelus, as Den 12. Hazy amber-brown colour, creamy beige head. Aroma of champagne yeast, grapes, green apple skin, figs, sweet malts, some hidden toffee. Flavour is quite sweet, creamy, figs, red fruits/roosvicee, malts, some toffee, bittersweet finish, alcohol bitterness. Full bodied, slightly alcoholic, very soft carbonation despite the champagne yeast (which is a good thing imo), creamy mouthfeel. Good.

cloudy brown, small offwhite head. nutty and malty aroma, quite nice. flavor is malty, nutty, boozy, quite well rounded, but rather strong.

Bottle@yesprs - Brown pour with beige head. Aroma and taste is sweet malty, with dark dried fruits, caramel sweetness, toffee, some spice action going on, sweet malty finish. Decent.

12 cl bottle. Pours hazy orange with a small off white head. Aroma is fruity and toasted malty and slight herbal. Sweet, toasted and slight caramelish into the finish. Bitter and slight herbal, dry and toasted finish.

First, let me discuss the original version, i.e. brewed limitedly by Eric Ameye, the man who started Gaverhopke in 1994 and - as far as I remember - only sold his beers at the door of the brewery. I was stupid enough to buy a whole crate of his beers - including this one - at the beginning of this century... Anyway, this was his magnum opus so to speak, an ’abt’ (quadrupel) with loose, unstable, dirty yellowish white head and dark wine red colour, hazy in general appearance. Strong estery aroma, caramel, port wine, chocolate, candi syrup, pear, overripe blue grapes, elderberries, brambleberries, raisins, cloves, some DMS (red cabbage) and a subtle sulphuric H2S hint, fortunately not present in all the bottles and less outspoken than in most other beers he brewed at that time. The taste was estery, sweet without stickiness, caramelly, smooth, meaty and earthy, very yeasty, port wine hint in the finish, warming alcohol, low hop bitterness. Clearly inspired by Westvleteren 12 but well below that quality level, though I did find this to be an interesting beer with a somewhat different personality than usual in this style. Then Ameye’s brewery was taken over, and the new owners updated many things, yet kept this locally legendary quad in existence. The new version now still comes from a Steini bottle but with totally different label; I bought this particular sample at Fontana in Sint-Niklaas. Loose, bubbly head taking a minimal amount of forcing to fully develop, retreating into an egg-white, moussy, irregular but steady rim over a hazy copper-tinged translucent brown beer with small clogs of dead yeast and proteins at the bottom. Aroma of old ruby port, no more H2S at all, sweet melting caramel candy, candied fig, rum-soaked raisins, baked banana, hint of red Haribo candy even, honey, toffee, maderisation (this is apparently an older bottle by itself), beef broth, ripe blue plum, brown sugar, brown rum, marzipan and nougat, chestnuts, apple sauce, gari, peppercorns. Very sweet onset, lots of stewed plum, banana chewing gum and candied fig with a sourish edge of ripe blackberries, soft carbonation, full but lean mouthfeel, a tad vinous. Residual brown sugar cloys a bit to the palate but adds a certain ’lightness’ to an otherwise filling, very caramelly and toffeeish, eventually almost chocolatey beer (meaning: cocoa powder diluted in water rather than milk), with ongoing banana ester and brown sugar sweetness in the finish; the sweetness sticks to the teeth a bit while at the same time retronasal madera and old port-like effects shine. Ends with a brief and superficial dash of earthy hops - only providing some vague background bitterness - and an afterglow of liqueurish, kahlua-like alcohol, while the brown sugary sweetness keeps cloying alongside overripe blue plum, banana and candied fig impressions, about the same flavours it began with, but the alcohol does add a certain ’pepperiness’ which is not at all unpleasant, certainly in combination with the maderisation. Lacks some complexity for a quadrupel but was lucky enough to experience elegant ageing, I do like the sweet madera- and ruby port-like aspects of this; the alcohol sits firmly in place too without overpowering anything, but this altogether too sweet and cloying even after a couple of years of ageing. Not a bad quad at all - didn’t even gush like many Gaverhopke beers of that time period did - just a bit too sweet and straightforward for what it could have been. In any case a totally different beer than the original version, the same degree of alcohol warmth and residual sweetness has been kept in order to maintain its original character I guess, but the outcome is altogether notably different. One conclusion can be made after tasting both versions, though: this is an interesting, demanding quad, but too simple and obviously way too sweet, both in Eric Ameye’s and Gudrun Vandoorne’s versions. I would not bother about this one too much anymore. My rating here is necessarily an average of both versions (2.9/5 for the original and 3.4/5 for the new one - this has very clearly improved in spite of losing some of its original character).

Well balanced quad but not necessarily a superior quad. Pours reddish orange without Much head or lacing. Floral yeast and some prune. Light sweet finish. Thick palate.

Bottle from Willems. Clear brown with a small off-white head. Aroma is sweet, malty, caramel, dried fruit and alcohol. Flavor is very sweet and moderate bitter. Sweet finish with warming alcohol. 160914