6.9

Appearance - 4 | Aroma - 7 | Flavor - 8 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 7.5

Summer edition of Zwarte Zjef, Paenhuys’ core beer, only made for their open brewing day two years ago so technically retired, but since it will be repeated in the future, I added it here anyway. Strong gusher, beer flooding out of the bottle neck upon opening. Thin, pale greyish white head, quickly reduced to a moussy rim of not much more than one millimeter and a couple of flat ’islands’ in the middle, both eventually disappearing altogether; dark but fully translucent wine red colour with beautifully deep and bright ruby red hue, initially clear with visible fizz, turning cloudy and more brownish after adding the sediment. Aroma clearly oxidized, but in an elegant way, breathing impressions of old ruby port, elderberry, butterscotch, sweet madera, candied fig, green walnuts, strawberry wine, ripe blue plum, liquorish, dry leather, gingerbread, faint hints of oxidized proteins (cooked chicken), cinnamon, banana, marmelade. Sweet onset, candied fig mixed with ripe pear and banana, hint of blue plum with a subtle but persistent, deeply situated, ’dim’ sourishness, black berry-ish, soft carbonation, supple and smooth, slick, very slightly cloying body. Thoroughly caramelly malt sweetness in the middle, nutty accents, a tad chocolatey even, but no true roasted bitterness as one would expect from a stout; ends dryish due to the nutty, toasted malt bitterishness becoming a bit more pronounced, supported by a herbal, lightly peppery hop bitter touch and an ’afterglow’ of port- or even rum-like alcohol, leaving a small amount of wryness on the root of the tongue. Oxidation, in a surprisingly elegant, old port- or sherry-like way, returns retronasally. Weird beer: I respected brewer’s intent in classifying this as a stout here, but it is clearly not black, nor does it carry the roasted bitterness I expect from anything labelled as a stout (Zwarte Zjef has the same issue, by the way). More a Scotch-like beer actually, but quite a pleasant one, sweet and rounded with just enough toasted bitterness to avoid becoming entirely boring, and with an amount of oxidation that I can appreciate (’portorisation’ is probably a better word here). Quite enjoyable sipper, in all, but whether it is regarded as a stout, a Scotch or something else, I fail to see what is so ’summery’ about it, but apparently - i.e. according to the brewer - it was more sour when young, and in that sense more refreshing...