One of these new Grimbergens on the Belgian market, this one "enriched with the best aroma hops" - seems like a slogan AB InBev could use for one of its (way too) many ’fakely hoppy’ Leffe Royale iterations, but more simple. I have no trust in this whatsoever so this one is just for the sake of ticking. Very thick, foamy, egg-white, very regularly shaped, ’papery’ lacing, very dense head over a cristal clear pure golden blonde beer with slightly warmer ’old gold’ tinge, no visible carbonation. Aroma of hand soap, freshly ironed linen cloth, wet paper, freshly cut grass, cotton, plaster, chewing gum, the cooked vegetable smell of pasteurisation, green apple, banana, dry white bread, plastic, breakfast cereals including the iron, straw, refined sugar. Sweet onset, lots of residual white sugar in a ’clean’ but still somewhat sticky way, banana ester, very bubblegummy, faint pear and sweet red apple notes, sharply fizzy carbonation, numbing and very minerally but even in this form unable to hide the high degree of unpleasant soapiness in its mouthfeel; this strong carbonation goes on over a meagre and typically Belgian sugar-enhanced, cereally-sweetish middle with slight grainy edges as well as something faintly metallic. Develops some basic spiciness in the finish, with a grassy hop bitterish touch, but also a lot of unpleasant plaster- and rubber-like flavours which cling to the mouth cavity in a disagreeable manner, leaving behind a kind of chemical wryness, more so than any credible or ’natural’ hop bitterness. As unpalatable as expected, not that far removed from the so-called hop-forward Leffe Royales or that awful Affligem Hop Selection. Typical run-of-the-mill, dead pasteurised and then intensely recarbonated industry product in which cutting down on the quality of ingredients is way too obvious for any experienced beer drinker to enjoy; overly gassy and fizzy on top of that, and that almost glue-like ’plasticness’ sticks to the back of the mouth for a long time. Any bit as unpleasant as I expected it to be - some of the Belgian trappist beers may have gone downhill in the past decades, but their decline remains altogether subtle and completely incomparable to the dark and dreary road these big industry-owned abbey beers have taken in the same amount of time. Nothing sincerely hoppy about this, just a somewhat less sugary, more grassy and bitter, but equally bubblegummy and ’plasticky’ version of Grimbergen Blond, a beer that reminds me mostly of the many hangovers I associate with my reckless youth and which I probably haven’t touched anymore since then. To be sampled in small quantities for nothing else but the sake of ticking, otherwise: please ignore this beer.

33cl bottle: BBD 5th Aug 2018. Poured into a Leffe chalice at home on 3rd Aug 2017. God knows where in Belgium I bought this, somewhere on the coast I think? Clear, clean and bright pour, light golden in colour, level white topping. Strange metallic bitterness to the brew, struggled to finish the glass (very unlike me). Had to find some salted biscuits to help me complete the tasting, some herbal nastiness within the beers make up too.

pours rather warm, bit darker blonde. Big white head fades rather fast. Smell is sweet, maltsyrup (hops, please ??? ) Taste is clear chemical bitterness, over a chemical maltsyrupy sweetness with arteficial honey notes. Very, very metallic ending. Usually, grimbergen barely has taste, and just a low level of quality. I now realize I prefer the usual grimbergen.