Good, dense cream-coloured head over amber-orange beer. Coloured malts, leafy, almonds in the nose. Bitterish, leafy overlying flavour on top of sweet(er) malty flavours. Slightly walnutty, again leafy, toasted. Dry, less sweet in the end, constantly on the edge, not really as balanced. Good carbonation. Not my favourite. Bitterness on one hand being a tad harsh - and yet lots of restsugars underneath. Txs to Stef!

Belgian style blonde named after a folk figure - like a few other recent Hofbrouwerijke beers - recommended in food pairing with very diverse food items (pasta, burgers, asparagus and salads)... No gushing this time, contrary to other Hofbrouwerijke beers I recently had - so I deemed this worth mentioning. Medium thick, audibly fizzing, membrane-lacing, egg-white, densely moussy and minute-bubbled, slowly and partially opening head on an initially near-clear, old-golden-hued pale orange blonde beer with lively sparkling and some dead yeast dots floating around everywhere, shifting to a misty peach-orange with sediment. Aroma of wet toast, nearly burnt white sugar and hard caramel, old dry biscuit, rusty iron, dried thyme, unripe apricot, damp earth, cooked turnip, dandelion, withering grass, raw kale, background hints of old dried out orange peel, halfripe banana, clove, beef broth and 'rusty' oxidation already dastardly setting in from below. Fruity onset, sweetish with apple peel, unripe peach and slight banana notes, sourish undertone accentuated by lively and minerally carbonation; light metallic 'zing' round a slick, grainy and faintly peanutty maltiness with some biscuity accents - but not enough to 'fill the flavour' in a way that could make this beer a lot better. Toasty bitterish accent in the finish along with phenolic spiciness (clove, thyme but also something rubbery), a first note of onsetting oxidation (rusty iron) and earthy, bit rooty hops offering a not very tasty, dandelion-ish bitterness of medium duration. Toasty- and nutty-malty accents seek connection with 'spéciale belge' here, which in itself is not a bad thing of course, but there are some phenolic and autolysis-induced off-flavours which should not have been there and traces of unfermented sugar stick to the teeth a bit. Rather clunky, unsophisticated, 'rough' Belgian blonde (or amber), but I guess one should not expect much better than this from Hofbrouwerijke, if I overlook all my previous experiences with this brewery... At least it did not gush and could be poured clearly (if properly done), these are basic technical aspects of bottle-conditioned Belgian ales Hofbrouwerijke does not even achieve in many of its other beers. Maybe I should not have waited for half a year with this one if I wanted to avoid the oxidation aspect which is clearly already present - or maybe it benefited from the cellaring and was even less sophisticated when young? I will never know, as I do not intend to get a new bottle for a 'fresh' rating, there are gazillions of more interesting beers to spend my money on...

Lichtbruin bier met schuim. Smaak is bitterzoet en licht kruidig met iets van graan, wat gras en citrus.

Mild herb-hefiger Beginn. Wenig würzig, geringe Bitterkeit, rund. Einfach, passt. 9/10/8/9//9

Sampled @ Zythos Beer Festival 2022. A hazy dark golden beer with a white lacing. Aroma of mid sweet juicy malt, yeast. Taste of mild juicy hops, wheat malt, apricot.