Tora Tora

Here is Struise flexing its muscles again: the already unbearably strong Kill & Destroy (apparently receiving many good reviews - I never understood why) aged further on 'jenever' barrels, an idea apparently raised by Holy Beer House, a client brewer in Lokeren specializing in barrel ageing, having worked with Alvinne and Deca before as well but actually erected by a guy who used to work for Struise and came 'back home' for this project, so to speak. I hate overly boozy beers and I hate jenever, so my expectations on this one are low to say the least, but I figured I had to give it a fair shake. Pale yellowish white, densely moussy to almost creamy, slightly lacing, thick and regular head, slowly thinning and opening on a near clear, bronze-tinged deep 'brownish' amber coloured beer with disparate sparkling. Aroma of indeed 'oude jenever', dusty old hazelnuts, triple sec, old orange zest, exotic pepper, lots of wet oak wood and its noble vanilla-like scent, tea, dry tree leaves, rubber, dried figs, grapefruit peel, nutmeg, caramel, bourbon still, leather, old dry abbey cheese rind, smoked eel accent, burnt sugar. Sweet onset, dense and vinous, with early signs of hop bitterness popping up already, amidst impressions of fig, pear and apricot, softish carb, oily and even somewhat syrupy body - but a burn of alcohol is apparent already from the first sip, so I am beginning to dread what is to come next. Indeed, the sweet, caramelly and hazelnutty maltiness with toasty edge that ensues is brutally ripped in half by extreme booziness, thinning and burning away, ruining the last remainders of what once was a solid old school DIPA - remainders, as the rest of this DIPA was already burned away by the bourbon treatment leading up to Kill & Destroy. Lots of hop bitterness still in the finish, peppery and leafy, with a clear citrus rind aspect to it - as well as that grapefruity retronasal aroma; strong woody tannins too, but both the hop bitterness and the tannic astringency only amplify the wryness of the booze, so that in the end, it feels like I am rating some kind of malt liquor - or liquor 'tout court'. The delicacies of the oak wood, the hops and the malts are all distorted and scorched by the alcohol, which still has a bit of bourbon sweetness in it, but is mostly jenever-coloured, in the most brutal, unpleasantly wry and obnoxious way possible. I had the greatest trouble finishing the bottle - in fact I don't think I would even have enjoyed this if it were poured in a 5 cl glass. The nose is still rather tolerable, remaining surprisingly discreet even if the alcohol is obvious enough, but what happens in my mouth is anything but pleasant. I know that boasting with superstrong beers has been a thing at Struise for many years - and this is not the first time the result is physically hard to drink, so apparently there is still a diehard fanbase behind them enjoying this kind of monstrosities. Feels like an old-fashioned West Coast IPA mixed with an equal portion of moonshine. Are these Struise's last throes of domination of the Belgian craft beer scene, or should we indeed blame its Holy Beer House offspring for this abomination? Let's conclude that Struise set out the opportunity with that overrated Kill & Destroy, and then David Rogiers came along to actually destroy it even further.