Belgian style blonde from the Périgord. Medium sized, moussy, pale greyish beige head; colour deep and warm orange blonde, flirting with amber, with fine sparkling and minute yeast particles divided over the liquid; turns from light hazy to fully cloudy as the bottle progresses. Restrainedly fruity and straightforwardly malty aroma (like all their other beers) with hints of biscuit, dry cake, sweet orange peel, cumin seed, roasted peanuts, vague strawberry, field flowers, earth, coriander, autumn leaves, and alas, DMS again (cooked vegetable), though fortunately not as strong as in their Blanche. Soft fruity onset with faint hints of orange peel, redcurrant and apple, minerally carbonation drying a bit, leading to a very bready, lightly toasted and somewhat nutty malt middle phase with some yeasty spiciness on top of it; finish has continuing bready malt sweetness, while an increasing yeast effect adds even more ’breadiness’. A certain dried orange peel flavour appears as well, and so does a light peppery, spicy, leafy and somewhat resiny hop bitterness, which even lingers a bit along with a bittersweet ’coriandery’ resin effect; I also get a whiff of warming alcohol all the way at the back, more so than expected from a beer of only 6% ABV. Malt-forward but relatively subtle thirst quencher, with a very bready character, just too bad for the DMS. In terms of style, this has a lot more in common with certain Belgian blondes (or even ambers, as its colour is darker than average for the style) than with actual bière de garde from the north of France. Cheers to Craftmember for bringing the entire range of this brewery from the Périgord to Belgium!

Had this one before a couple of years ago but at the request of Craftmember, now re-rating from a comparative tasting: a 75 cl bottle from March 2017 versus a 33 cl bottle from November 2016, apparently each made with a different (local) honey. In general, a beer with a moussy, thickly lacing, egg-white and well-retaining head, a bit more loose and less stable on the 33 cl than on the 75 cl, over a warm peach blonde beer with amberish hue, lightly hazy at first but slowly shifting to a mud pool-like ochre as the sediment is gradually added. The 33 cl version looks a tad paler than the 75 cl version. Both have hints of bread, orange peel, peach, dried apricot, recognisable honey, red apple, caramel, dough, chestnut, camomile, baker’s yeast and dried herbs in the nose, with the 33 cl more ’bright’ and floral than the 75 cl, which comes across as more bready, more caramelly and more ’candied orange’-like, suggesting that perhaps a darker variety of honey has been used; the 33 cl also has more actual honey aroma. Fruity, mildly estery onset, dried apricot, apple and peach, crisp and vivid, with the 33 cl a bit more ’fresh’ (in spite of being older) and radiant, with a sharper, more coarse carbonation and a tad more sourishness than the 75 cl. Pleasantly bready malt sweetish middle, the sweetness accentuated by an elegant caramelly edge as well as by residual sugary sweetness which I assume is a remainder of the honey - with again the 75 cl being more ’sedate’ and more rounded than the 33 cl. This delicate sweetness lingers in the finish without ever becoming cloying, balanced by the breadiness of both malts and yeast (the latter especially after adding the sediment, obviously, even a bit ’clay-like’ in the very end especially in the 75 cl); an earthy, rooty hop bitter touch shows up at the very end and provides background structure against the sweetness. Its bittering properties are more obvious and outspoken after adding the sediment (no surprise, of course) and more so in the 75 cl than in the 33 cl. In all, I’d recommend this from a 75 cl bottle, which is a bit ’deeper’ and better balanced than the 33 cl. A pleasant enough beer especially in the context of southwestern France; could pass for any Belgian honey ale, really - if I hadn’t known that this is brewed by an Irishman in the Dordogne, I could have easily believed that this was made by some traditional Belgian ale brewery.

Thanks to Craftmember for this bottle. Unspecified wheat beer with thick, creamy, densely lacing, snow white head and brownish peach blonde colour, hazy but completely murky with yeast deposit. Aroma of dough, chestnut, soapy wheat but subtle, earth, dried leaves, bitter honey, straw, apple peel, peach; a smaller bottle tasted earlier yielded strong DMS (cooked cabbage) but this was not present in a 75 cl bottle so I’ll take the latter as the basis for this rating. Soft, restrained fruitiness in onset, faint hints of apple and peach, quite crisp feeling with a soft mouthfeel, light and ’deaf’ background wheat sourishness, straightforward bready maltiness, yeasty to the point of becoming powdery in the end; low, leafy hoppiness without strong bittering properties, as usual in wheat beers. "Blanche foncée" in this case is basically the same as "tarwedubbel", rather than Dunkelweizen, and I do think that ’genetically’ this is more closely related to the Belgian witbier tradition than to the German Weissbier tradition.

The darkest beer from this small brewery in the Périgord. Stable, moussy, light beige head over a deep, dark mahogany brown beer - but not at all black as the ’stout’ designation would suggest. Aroma of toasted bread, hazelnuts, pear syrup, some vanilla or another elusive ethereal whiff, lots of caramel candy. Restrained estery fruitiness in the mouth, touch dried banana, bit oily mouthfeel, nutty, caramelly and toasted malts, light peppery hop touch but fading as quickly as it came, earthy, with above all continuing malt sweetness. In itself a pleasant enough beer, but in terms of style, this is clearly a miss: the brewer allegedly names it a stout for commercial reasons, but why not relabel it as a (brown) porter, which is much closer to the truth? I am confident that the local French audience will get used to it and that way, beer consumers from elsewhere will feel less ’fooled’... Anyway, thanks to Craftmember for sharing this and I did enjoy it, so I will not take "truth to style" into account here.

Chestnut beer (litterally) from a micro brewery in the Périgord region of France, thanks to Craftmember for sharing. Stable, lacing, creamy, yellowish beige head, misty amber colour. Aroma has a perfumey lavender soap-like quality to it, sweet chestnuts, acacia honey, field flowers, caramel, roses. Soft fruitiness, dried apricot, hint of apple peel, nutty with a strangely but pleasantly sweet chestnut quality to it, ’fluffy’ mouthfeel, yeasty finish with a very light leafy hoppiness without truly bittering. Unusual and interesting.

Thank you for sharing! Sampled bottled @ Gents Bierfestival 2015. Dark brown, little mocha. Nose is sweetish cacao powder, sugar, light toffee. Taste is sugar, caramel, light roast, cacao puffs, a bit weak & thin, caramel, malty, light bitterness. A bit thin & sugary. Decent but not outstanding.

(23/08/2015) Thank you for sharing! Sampled 330 ml. bottle @ Gents Bierfestival 2015. Hazy orange, little white head. Nose is light yeast, corn cereal sweetness in a pleasant way, sugar, what I assume are chestnuts. Taste is same pleasant interesting corn cereal, sugar, candy, chestnut sweetness, malt. Light candy body. Quite pleasant, a nice one, good sweetish beer. (3.9/5) (21/08/2015) Changed recipe apparently. Thx! Sampled @ Gents Bierfestival 2018. Tried again, way less of a fan, thin fizzy mocha, leaves, stale BE, rating way lower,... (3.4/5)

Brown colour, off-white head. Malty aroma, caramel, sugars. Sweet malty flavour, caramel. Finish malts and caramel.
(from 33cL bottle @ VIP school, Gent. Thanks for sharing, craft beer enthusiast)

Hazy warm golden colour, white head. Aroma of chestnuts, malts. Sweet flavour, chestnuts, malt. Sweet finish, chestnuts, brown sugar. Well made, lots of space for the humble chestnut to shine.
(from 33cL bottle @ VIP School, Gent. Thanks for sharing, enthusiastic GBF visitor!)

Bottled. A hazy red-brown beer with a tan head. The aroma has notes of malt, caramel, alcohol, and a bit of roasted malt. The flavor is sweet with notes of roasted malt, caramel, and a bit of bread, leading to a dry roasted finish. Thanks humlelala for sharing.