6.6

Appearance - 6 | Aroma - 7 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 6.5

Classically styled saison brewed at Borinage by Hélène Colmant, a young Walloon entrepreneur passionate about beer - and I, for one, can only welcome an enterprising female brewer to the Belgian beer scene, a world still largely dominated by men, though perhaps a bit less so than before. I would not, however, grant this enterprise the status of 'brewery' here with just one single, new beer and would have placed the beer simply under Borinage, but I will not ask to have it corrected as I suppose (and hope) this enthusiastic young lady will come up with more beers in the future. Thick and frothy, egg-white, closed and very stable, lightly lacing head on a hazy orangey-peach blonde beer with refined, but very lively sparkling. Aroma of ripe peach, banana peel and quite strongly so, strawberry candy, sugar loaf, coriander seed, 'Babbelutten', honey, sweet red apple, background hints of clove, freshly cut raw cabbage, bubblegum and roses. Gentle, sweet onset, lots of banana ester mixed with impressions of ripe pear, red apple and strawberry, lively carbonation with minerally effects, sparkling on the tongue in a nonetheless relatively refined manner; supple, slightly glueish body, a smooth brioche bread- and slightly biscuit-like maltiness with a caramelly edge and a thin layer of honeyish sweetness on top; the minerally 'stimuli' continue all the way through, also as the beer acquires a mild floral hop bitterness, a pinch of spicy-soapy coriander and quite outspoken, but non-disturbing spicy phenols (clove, even a very vague and volatile touch of eucalyptus). Remains honeyishly sweet, however, clearly too much so for a saison even in the traditional sense - this has no reason to be called anything else than generic Belgian blonde, but not a bad one as such, not showing any off-flavours or other errors. Elegant, accessible, easygoing quencher - cheers to the little girl Colmant!