hawthorne00 (9781) reviewed Super Saison from La Sirène Brewing 11 years ago
Appearance - 6 | Aroma - 8 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 8
Bottle. Gold with a modest white head. Carbonation is quite high. Aroma is grainy with oranges, apricots, earthy funk, dough. Sweet with with boiled oranges, some sour oranges, apricots, dough, spices. A bit boozy. Dry and quite bitter finish with cloves and vanilla as well as oranges. Liked this a bit less than the ordinary saison. I guess at this strength the flavour balance doesn’t work quite so well for me - I want either an easy-going rustic sweet/tart/bitter thing or a cleaner powerful pale malt base with supporting nuances. Still, pretty good.
Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 9 | Flavor - 8 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 8
Pours black with an off-white head.Nose shows chocolate and hazelnut pralines, pretty much Ferrero Rocher. So tempting.A fair bit of the nutella/praline notes transfer through as the dominant flavour followed by a little Belgian dubbel-like brown sugar.Carbonation seems a bit aggressive, body a bit watery.
Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 7 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 7.5
Dark with a creamy tan head. Aroma is malty chocolate, nutty, Kahlua, sweet caramel, cocoa. Full, velvety body. Very interesting and makes for a great dessert beer. While very nice, a half pint was enough for me.
Appearance - 6 | Aroma - 7 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 8
[8/14] Growler, 12C. Black with a tan head. Lovely aroma of milk chocolate, vanilla and freshly toasted hazelnuts. 8+ Maybe more like a Swiss praline than a Belgian one :). Very silky, getting towards ingratiatingly so. Rich and milk sweet with lots of chocolate and vanilla, less obvious hazelnut than in the aroma. A bit earthy and with a touch of sourness as well as sweetness that I sometimes get from milk. Dries out slightly at the end. Vanilla finish with modest bitterness that builds a little. Good, but magic confined to the aroma. [8 3 7 3 15 =3.6] [10/17] Bottle. Aroma is cruder but the beer is better (at least for me). Rustic with nuts, grass and chocolate aroma. Medium bodied, smoothish. Sweet, slightly earthy, nutty. Chocolate smooths things over. Doesn't dry out much, but there's a little jolt of vanilla-tinged bitterness. The lactose registers in the aftertaste. Bitterness seems higher.
hawthorne00 (9781) reviewed Fleur Folie from La Sirène Brewing 11 years ago
Appearance - 6 | Aroma - 8 | Flavor - 8 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 9
[6/14] Gold with a excessively huge white head. Aroma of hay, light dough, floral honey, orange blossoms. Sweet honeyed dough, just sourish oranges, peppery and mildly bitter and dry at the end. High carbonation. Very lovely honey notes, lovely balance. More than met high expectations. [4.0][3/15] BB 1/15 but really hasn’t dropped off at all. Again, ridiculously huge head: a 375ml bottle into a 600ml glass is 5/6th head and the foam of the remainder is creeping out of the bottle after 5 minutes. But it’s _not_ overcarbonated to drink, about normal for a saison. And other than that this is just top drawer.[10/15] Another batch 1, BB 1/15. Now a moderate though determined gusher. Not changed that much: drier now with honey and dough yielding more to under-ripe nectarines. Some minerals. Still quite floral. Still buying this, just using a big glass.[2/18] A new batch. More sensible head - fits in a Duvel glass. Aroma is different, having some lemon and earthy notes as well as crackery dough and honey. I like the combination of creamy texture, floral honey with seeming sweetness and dry finish.
Appearance - 6 | Aroma - 8 | Flavor - 8 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 8.5
0.75cl Bottle: brought to the Belgian Beer Board Pre-Brugge beer festival bottle exchange by Filip, thanks mate. An Australian Saison, what a surprise to see this in Brugge. I loved it. Misty golden body (it had been poured a few times before I got my hands on it) with a white covering, I managed to get just under a half-pint into my glass: didn’t want to appear greedy did I? Yeasty farmyard; proper Saison smells in other words. Sour yeastiness in the mouth along with a sweet undertone that blend together giving a truly memorable experience and a wonderful taste. So different to anything else at the bottle swap: some cracking brews, but this and the Ommegang 3 Philosophers really stood out for me in their classiness, even though they are worlds apart in styles.
Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 7 | Flavor - 6 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 6
6th August 2013
Tasting at Bruce’s pad. Thanks to Leighton and Josh. Hazy gold beer, good white head. Softish palate with good fine carbonation. Slightly bitter floral note. Whisper of citrus. Softish dry finish with a floral bitter linger.
Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 7 | Flavor - 8 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 7.5
Bottle at Jack’s Farwell Tasting, thanks to Leighton, 06/08/13. Hazed golden amber with a thin off white head. Nose is tarte fruit, apricots, farmy, grass, lemon rind. Taste comprises tarte apricot, light tropical notes, soured peach, light funk. Medium bodied, fine carbonation, crisp and refreshing in the finish. Very good saison.
Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 7 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 7.5
Bottle thanks to Leighton at Jack’s farewell tasting. It pours hazy golden orange with a small white head. The nose is earthy, peach, apricot, yoghurt, light sourness and some sherbet. The taste is sherbet, earth, hay, orange, peach, apricot, straw and sweet dough. Medium body, moderate carbonation and foamy mouth-feel. Smooth, well balanced and rather drinkable stuff.
Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 8 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 8
Bottle shared at Bruce’s in London during Jack’s farewell tasting. Thanks to Josh for trading this one to me. A slow gusher! Pours mostly clear, pale yellow with a fine, foamy white head. Some dry and yeasty dough in the nose, a bit of lemon. Light to medium sweet sweet flavor, a bit of funk, some lemon merengue, hay. Light bodied with lively carbonation. Light sweet finish, fairly sweet white bread, subtle horse blanket, wet hay, light funk. Very drinkable and refreshing.