26/XII/22 - 33cl bottle from Geers (Oostakker), shared @ home, BB: n/a (2022-1770)

Pretty cloudy orange blond beer, small creamy off-white head, little stable, a bit adhesive. Aroma: sweet, caramel malts, tropical fruits, juicy, a little yeasty, oranges, a bit oxidized. MF: ok carbon, medium body. Taste: a bit sourish, fruity touch, orange peel, bitter, sweet malts, some caramel, a little chemical. Aftertaste: bitter, slightly sweet, chemical touch. Mediocre but not bad.

Advent #10

--Bottled at Pressklubben, Stockholm. -- Clear bright golden, small head. Floral honey and marzipan up front. Mid sweet with medium body and rounded mouthfeel. Dense, doughy and fruity. Floral, grassy hops. Mid bitter finish. A touch of that Belgian elegance.

33cl bottle at Pressklubben. Poured clear golden. Honey sweetness, warmth, spiciness. Pretty much what you expect.

15/VII/22 - 33cl bottle from Geers (Oostakker), shared @ home, BB: 20/XII/24 (2022-882)

Clear dark brown beer, big creamy solid beige head, a bit irregular, stable, non adhesive. Aroma: floral touch, fruity, weird, this doesn’t smell like a stout? Quite some CO2, pretty malty, yeast touch. MF: ok carbon, medium body. Taste: malty start, good roast, caramel, a bit sweet, some chocolate, a bit sourish, nice one. Aftertaste: bitter touch, good roast, caramel, malty backbone,yeasty, some mocha, dark chocolate, hoppy bitterness, decent milk stout, even if I don’t get a lot of lactose!

Fles uit advent kalender, gedeeld met Roelzie. Het is een pikzwart bier met een dun beige schuim. Het heeft een aroma van noten en caramel. De smaak is gebrand, moutig en gedroogd fruit.

Apple-flavoured Gose by Broers, bottle from De Messe, their new tasting room located in an abandoned church deep in the village of Wachtebeke (Overslag, to be precise – I should add it as a new place here I suppose). Gusher, but manageable. Snow white, moussy, thick, regular, rocky head on an initially clear pale yellowish-straw golden beer with visible sparkling, misty with sediment. Aroma of indeed freshly cut Granny Smith apple and strongly so, wakame, Sauerkraut, green gooseberries, sourdough, cucumber peel, unripe pear, wood sorrel leaf, kefir, flour. Crisp onset, lots of green fruit with indeed a very large portion of Granny Smith apple but side notes of cucumber and unripe pineapple as well, lively carbonation; lean, supple, lightly wheat-soapy body. Sourdoughy and cereally malt middle, clear soapy-sourish wheat with the expected salty edges (wakame), as well as ‘dark green’ cucumber peel and wood sorrel impressions. The green apple addition (eventually feeling more sweet than sour) strongly lingers in the end, overpowering not just a delicate touch of floral (but not so much bitter) hoppiness and increasing yeasty breadiness, but also the saltiness. Delivers what it promises, without the technical flaws of the previous two Broers beers I had before this one (Kveik Strong Ale and Brewer’s Gold IPA); correct, solid and quite original, though I personally would not have minded just a tad less apple and a tad more salt.

Inspired by American strong ale ‘à la’ Stone Arrogant Bastard and fermented with a kveik yeast strain as the current hype prescribes, this is one of the more unexpected beers coming from Broers; bought at their provisional premises, “De Messe”, in the church of Overslag, Wachtebeke. Medium thick, moussy, snow white, stable head on a misty, ruddy caramel brown beer with coppery tinge. Aroma of brown bread crumbs, old gingerbread, bergamot, red apple peel, tea, medlar, clove, smoked paprika powder, dried orange zest and a strong medicinal-phenolic effect (almost chlorine-like). Subduedly sweetish onset, dried fig, medlar, some vague blackberry sourishness running underneath, medium carbonation, full body; old-walnutty, brown-bready and hard-caramelly maltiness, powdery yeast feel, vague leathery note. A toasty malt bitter edge develops in the finish, aided by a leafy, very herbal and tea-like hoppiness, some warming ‘jenever’-like alcohol (though well hidden), ‘dirty’-bready yeastiness and strong phenolic effects varying from exotic spice to band aid… A mishmash of flavours, including off-flavours, this beer feels unfinished and unbalanced, with a weird phenolic aroma from the kveik having not been treated too well here, I am afraid. Lots of room for improvement!

New Broers IPA showcasing Brewer’s Gold – a very ‘retro’ approach to IPA to say the least, considering this hop variety has been in existence since the early 20th century… I hope I can count on a classically English style IPA then. Bottle from the brewery. Creamy, membrane-lacing, snow white, thick and frothy, hops-enhanced head on an initially clear, pure orange-tinged peach blonde beer, turning cloudy and eventually even beige-tinged ‘muddy’ with sediment. Aroma of drying orange peel, soggy wholegrain bread, dried peach, old ‘herbes de Provençe’, clove, stewed turnip, damp earth, raw carrot, wormwood leaf, beetroot, clay. Estery onset, a bit ‘dirty’ even at the start with notes of red apple, unripe apricot and vague pear, fizzily carbonated and restrained in sweetness; very bready malt middle with slight rusk-like edges, becoming increasingly bready-yeasty towards the finish, ending dirty and muddy in the end – though not before being bittered by strong, leafy, earthy, wormwood and peppery hop bitterness, adding a bit of retronasal dried orange peel aroma. The yeastiness almost overpowers the hops here, though – something which can only happen in a Belgian IPA, and even then it should be considered a flaw… Way too yeasty and not really a compliment even for an old hop variety, but with some cleaning up (and a different yeast strain perhaps), I am sure this beer can be improved a lot.