Medium, white head over finely carbonated, faintly veiled darker golden beer. Smells a bit oxydized, grains, sweet malts. Malts - pale and partly toasted - cornflakes. Little bit leafy. THe alcohol lends it a bit liqueurish stamina, but the whole is fade. Slick, medium carbonation, bit of alcoholwarmth. Superfluous.

Bottle from Hopduvel.
A: hazy orange, stable, foamy, off-white head.
A: coriander, chewing gum, overripe orange, vodka, soap.
T: sweet orange, plum, banana, soapy coriander, yeast, white bread.
F: floral hops, overripe yellow fruits, yeast, warming vodka-like alcohol.
P: medium body, oily texture, average carbonation.
Typical Belgian snorefest with quite a lot of obnoxious elements.

Light hazy blond colour, white creamy foam. Nose of honey, sweet malts, some herbal notes (coriander). Taste is very sweet, honeyish, unbalanced.

33cl bottle. A clear golden beer with a white head. Aroma of pale malt, straw, mild spicy hops. Taste of herbal pale malt, grains, some yeast. Moderate bitterness.

Of all those wonderful historical buildings in my city of Ghent, I have always found the Saint Baafs abbey one of the most fascinating: it is the oldest building of Ghent, basically the site where the city originated, and still resides in a quiet corner outside of the city centre, as a sombre ruin right across the equally sombre Saint Macharius church - a ruin where, if you have enough imagination, you can still feel the spirits of the early medieval monks wandering around. It is this historical monument after which this new Ghent beer - brewed in another corner of East Flanders - is named, rather cheaply taking advantage of the abbey beer cult in Belgium without actually having a link with the remnants of this abbey. The man behind it, former cab driver Joeri Cools, is no stranger to the beer hype and is well known as the creator of the Libidus brand (which he sold out), co-initiator of the new Coucou brand, and promotor of a pack of beers from the Meetjesland region northwest of Ghent. Snow white, pillowy, dense, stable, lacing head on a misty pale orange-tinged peach blonde beer. Aroma of peach, coriander seed (quite strong), apple peel, some caramel, grass, rusk, banana peel, minerals, clear DMS when warming up and even young 'jenever' - whereas I do not normally expect to detect alcohol at this ABV... Fruity, sweetish onset, dried peach and banana, clear white candi syrup sweetness joining in, in a turbulent environment of sharply numbing (over)carbonation; supple core, lingering minerality from the carbonation through a bread-crusty and bit rusk-like maltiness, with a more cereally edge. Clear coriander seed spiciness in the finish, paired with a mild floral hop bitter touch and lingering honeyish sweetness (too much so for its own good) - followed by a brief but unmistakable alcohol flavour ('jenever'). That last element surprised me - it is rare that at this strenght, the alcohol is so badly hidden. The DMS (overcooked broccoli) made things worse, and other than that this beer stacks every cliché of blonde abbey beer on top of the other, including the classic coriander overdose. A 'fake' abbey beer, completely cliché and not even completely free of technical flaws: as I already expected when I first read about this beer's introduction in the local newspaper, nobody in Ghent was waiting for it. At least not me.