Justičná tasting 8/2025. Hazy yellow color with minimal white head. Aroma of lactic sourness, wheat, rye, funk. Taste is moderate sour, funky, fruity estery, rye. Very good.

I've had almost 50 Alvinne beers but apparently not this, their most popular one. It's good, but pretty average for them. Of course, their average is very good.

One of those mighty Fellowship beers from Alvinne - more often than not masterpieces of originality and sheer deliciousness - consisting of a madera barrel aged wheat wine blended with an aquavit barrel aged tripel, resulting in, I guess, an even more complex 'barley-wheat wine' of sorts. Medium thick, off-white, papery lacing, slowly breaking head over a hazy peach blonde robe with ochre tinge. Intense and alluring bouquet of apricots soaked in brandy, sweet madera very obvious, vanilla from oak wood, marmalade, old apple cake, some almond, vague strawberry, dried basil, honey liqueur, brioche dough, sweaty funky note. Very fruity, estery onset, hinting at peach, ripe yellow plum, cooked apple and pear, with a very light sourishness underneath a more pronounced, rounded sweetness; medium carb, full mouthfeel - though more 'fluffy' and tripel-like than vinous and barleywine-like, perhaps. Soft sweet bready and cake bottom-like malts, opulent and adorned with considerable 'woodiness' including that lovely vanillin effect from oak, but also with light 'wild' notes (slight Bretty sweatiness) and herbal accents (green herbs) probably coming from the aquavit. The madera adds a sweet wine-like aspect while soft breadiness and vivid fruitiness linger, gently but adequately bittered by herbal hops and warmed by the alcohol, which somehow remains very friendly and inviting. A note of marzipan lingers faraway in the background. Complex, rich sipper, somewhere in between a barley (or indeed wheat) wine and a tripel, but that is exactly what it physically is so that comes as no surprise; in any case Alvinne's two decades of experience with barrel ageing and blending is amply illustrated here. I need to seek them out more, I had truckloads of their beers in the past but I am still impressed whenever I encounter one - the fact alone that they keep producing original masterpieces (or excellent beers) as if it takes no effort, remains quite remarkable. As I may have stated more than once before: this is a world class brewery and should therefore be treated with according respect.

Half a 330ml bottle at Eric the Red in Moscow. Pours almost clear dark amber with a small beige head. Aroma is vinegar, cherries, malt. Taste is medium sour. Dry finish. Medium bodied. Classy.