6.8/10
—
Appearance 4
Aroma 8
Flavor 7
Texture 6
Overall 7
The summer beer in this Illegaal series, issued by a namesake non-profit organisation in Brussels using beer to unite and support young artists making their way in the world of street art, music and so on; they have these beers brewed at Jandrain-Jandrenouille to original recipes and that includes this Khop Killer. Bottle bought online, lot number 728-200227 apparently, brewed in February of this year. Medium sized, egg-white, bit irregular and uneven-bubbled head showing gaps but otherwise quite well-retaining, over a hazy straw blonde beer with ochre-ish tinge. Aroma of lime blossoms, lemon grass, some lemon candy even, dry bread crust, old rusk, jute bags, dry straw, angelica flowers, stale apple juice, something vaguely urine-like, dry white pepper, pineapple, minerals. Spritzy onset, lots of fizzy carbonation but not in a harshly stinging way, very minerally still, rushing through fruity aspects of pineapple, banana peel, green apple and unripe peach - yet remaining very low in sweetness; this dry profile continues in the middle, when a slick, bread crumb- and even old potato-like maltiness develops, under growing spiciness from hops and some phenols; lots of yeasty breadiness in the end (powdery) but also a firm, rooty hop bitterness, quinine- and grapefruit peel-ish, bringing slight tropical-flowery and citric-zesty aspects retronasally which I imagine must have been a lot more bright when the beer was still young. More characterful than I was expecting, but clearly it has not kept very well even if I am still drinking it before its best before date: the yeast turned into a powdery, almost starchy 'bread crumb' effect and the hops must have lost most of their glow. Still very drinkable though, if you consider it to be a blonde bitter or even a saison of sorts, rather than an hazy IPA by which it seems vaguely influenced.
Tried
from Bottle
on 04 Jan 2021
at 00:13