Ristorno’s & Rabatten

10 April 2022. At 14de Brugs Bierfestival. Cheers to Anke & Pieter!

Hazy dark brown, small, foamy, beige head. Aroma of fig, red apple, pear, prune, walnut, toast. Taste has sweet fig & apple, sourish brambleberry; softly toasty & nutty malty. Herbal hoppy finish with dried fruits, a softly roasted aspect and some spices. Medium body, slick texture, average carbonation. Brown IPA, then?

10/VII/21 - 33cl bottle from Bierhalle Deconinck (Vichte), shared @ Anniek and Martijn’s place, bottled: 20/IX/20, BB: bottle date +2Y (2021-609)

Little cloudy dark brown beer, big fizzy aery beige head, unstable, falls down quickly. Aroma: very floral, bit fruity, yeast, slightly funky, some dried fruits. MF: lively carbon, medium body. Taste: bitter start, bit malty, hoppy, grassy, slightly roasted, good bitterness. Aftertaste: hoppy, resinous, very bitter, dry, resinous, little medicinal, soft roast.

Newish (October last year) beer from d'Oude Maalderij, the brewery from which The Mash arose, thematically inspired by tax controls plaguing the company - and therefore deliberately black and bitter. Strangely comes with two labels, one with the name Ristorno's and the other with the name Rabatten, so you will not find a bottle with both names on it; both are the same beer, though - could be seen as an outright parody on the practice of 'etiketbier' (selling the same beer under different names)... I have the Rabatten version in front of me, in any case. Relatively slow but very determined gusher, foam coming out of the bottle one or two seconds after opening, and continuing for a while after that - but the stream tumbles along slow enough to capture every drop without loss. A typical 'gushing head' forms during pouring: very thick and foamy initially, pale greyish beige in colour, irregularly shaped yet very frothy and leaving thick, irregular patches of plaster-like lacing after collapsing (and partially opening); cloudy, very dark chocolate brown robe, blackish in general appearance, with ruddy-burgundy hue. Aroma of fresh wormwood leaves, old walnuts, toffee in a non-sweet way, toasted brown bread, nutmeg, dry autumn leaves, tea bags, dried prunes, vague hints of black pipe tobacco, molasses, moldy acorn tops, damp earth, old dry cookies, rainwater, days old grilled meat on the brink of going bad, something faintly iron-like a naturally feeling way (blood). Fruity onset but restrained in sweetness, dried fig and prune, dim but consistent sourish undertone (very vaguely blackberry-ish), medium carbonation, slick and lean mouthfeel, general aspect of ferrous water underneath; toasted-nutty and brown-bready maltiness, low in sweetness so that the toasted bitterness can freely reign, though not evolving into stout-like roasted coffee bitterness: instead, the bready part takes over and supports a firm, leafy, rooty, herbal hop bitterness, earthy in the end when bready yeast effects become stronger and classic Belgian phenolic spiciness sets in. Ends dry, very spicy-leafy and earthy. Well, this beer does tilt the balance from toasted malts to bitter hops at exactly the right moment and that in itself is a core attribute of any good black IPA to me, but it is also an earthy, even somewhat 'dirty' beer with lots of Belgian spice effects (though nothing unpleasant) - maybe "Belgian dark IPA", to the analogy of supposedly blonde "Belgian IPA", should be a category of its own, even if there are not many specimens around that would fit it... Anyway, I bought one and therefore helped Jef (the brewer) pay his tax bills - I hope he appreciates it. --- Beer merged from original tick of Ristorno's / Rabatten on 30 Jan 2021 at 23:29 - Score: Appearance - 4 | Aroma - 7 | Flavor - 8 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 7.5. Original review text: Newish (October last year) beer from d'Oude Maalderij, the brewery from which The Mash arose, thematically inspired by tax controls plaguing the company - and therefore deliberately black and bitter. Strangely comes with two labels, one with the name Ristorno's and the other with the name Rabatten, so you will not find a bottle with both names on it; both are the same beer, though - could be seen as an outright parody on the practice of 'etiketbier' (selling the same beer under different names)... I have the Rabatten version in front of me, in any case. Relatively slow but very determined gusher, foam coming out of the bottle one or two seconds after opening, and continuing for a while after that - but the stream tumbles along slow enough to capture every drop without loss. A typical 'gushing head' forms during pouring: very thick and foamy initially, pale greyish beige in colour, irregularly shaped yet very frothy and leaving thick, irregular patches of plaster-like lacing after collapsing (and partially opening); cloudy, very dark chocolate brown robe, blackish in general appearance, with ruddy-burgundy hue. Aroma of fresh wormwood leaves, old walnuts, toffee in a non-sweet way, toasted brown bread, nutmeg, dry autumn leaves, tea bags, dried prunes, vague hints of black pipe tobacco, molasses, moldy acorn tops, damp earth, old dry cookies, rainwater, days old grilled meat on the brink of going bad, something faintly iron-like a naturally feeling way (blood). Fruity onset but restrained in sweetness, dried fig and prune, dim but consistent sourish undertone (very vaguely blackberry-ish), medium carbonation, slick and lean mouthfeel, general aspect of ferrous water underneath; toasted-nutty and brown-bready maltiness, low in sweetness so that the toasted bitterness can freely reign, though not evolving into stout-like roasted coffee bitterness: instead, the bready part takes over and supports a firm, leafy, rooty, herbal hop bitterness, earthy in the end when bready yeast effects become stronger and classic Belgian phenolic spiciness sets in. Ends dry, very spicy-leafy and earthy. Well, this beer does tilt the balance from toasted malts to bitter hops at exactly the right moment and that in itself is a core attribute of any good black IPA to me, but it is also an earthy, even somewhat 'dirty' beer with lots of Belgian spice effects (though nothing unpleasant) - maybe Belgian dark IPA, to the analogy of supposedly blonde Belgian IPA, should be a category of its own, even if there are not many specimens around that would fit it... Anyway, I bought one and therefore helped Jef (the brewer) pay his tax bills - I hope he appreciates it.