#tripel

Donkergeel bier met mooie schuimkraag. Smaak is bitter hoppig en enigszins fruitig met iets van mandarijn, abrikoos en wat citrus.

Imperial stout by Atrium, aged in bourbon barrels; fits in the 'Atrium Reserva' series and comes with classy label (too bad people do not seem to bother too much anymore with adding a picture when they create a new beer on this site...). Tightly membrane-lacing, medium thick, tiny-bubbled, greyish pale beige, slowly breaking head but retaining well as a firm creamy ring and greyish veil over a very dark chocolate brown beer - as good as black, but with still some reddish burgundy-hued translucency. Aroma of toffee, prunes soaked in eau de vie, sweet vanilla-ish bourbon and oak wood, cocoa, fig juice, freshly cut red apple peel, latté macchiato, burnt toast piercing through, old hazelnuts, hints of ruby port, damp earth, faint liquorish, dried blackberries and freshly whipped cream. Sweet, dense onset, residual candi-like sugars with near-juicy fruity notes of fig, pear and red apple, slight sourish streak of blackberry underneath, lively carbonated with very full, thick, syrupy body, a bit thinned by alcohol. Slight bubblegummy effects and lingering dark but lively, estery fruitiness accompany a rounded toffeeish malt middle with Ersatz-chocolatey and lightly pecan-nutty sides, maintaining too much sweetness for me, even when a bit of coffee-like roasted bitterness comes along; the bourbon, very clearly present, adds extra sweetness and a lot of sweet alcohol, making the finish astringently boozy. Apart from the alcohol glow (and wryness - though this aspect is largely absorbed by the malts), vanilla-like oak aspects pop up, but in a much too subtle way; woody tannins also remain too weak to put up against the overall toffeeish and bubblegummy sweetness. Candied dark fruit and cocoa notes linger in the end. Why do these strong stouts always have to be so damn sweet these days? I think I know why, but I did not work my way through a bunch of dry, roasted bitter ones for years to now end up with this. I was expecting more, even though I am well aware that Atrium has produced some pretty sweet stouts throughout the years - but this one does not contain lactose and is not intended as a pastry stout, so I guess I was hoping for an old school 'BBA' imperial stout along the lines of BCBS or Founders' KBS. I think ageing it for a longer time on a barrel with less leftover bourbon, so that the wood becomes more prominent and can add more drying tannins, could greatly improve this one; more roasted barley in the malt bill may help too, but that would be altering the basic recipe, of course... But while we are at it: maybe another yeast with a less 'bubblegummy' ester effect could be a good start as well, because this aspect kept bothering me all the way through, maybe even more so than the sweetness. In all: ambitious and certainly interesting, but not really achieving those ambitions, at least not in my opinion.

Pours black, no real head. Scent is dense, gingerbread, tonka. Taste is full, intense and fairly thick. Tonka, gingerbread. Chocolate, booze, strong and syrupy. Not bad. Bit too much tonka for me.

Dark brown with thin head. Aroma of bready malts and some caramel. Luckily this is not too sweet. There's a caramel note but there's a slight burnt bitter edge. Surprisingly well balanced.

Fruity hop bomb

Irish style dry stout from this Walloon craft brewer with Brazilian flair, though in this case the Portuguese ‘breu’ in the name seems to be the only connection with Brazil. Bottle from Poseidon Beers, shared with Craftmember. Very thick and foamy, pale greyish-beige, pillowy, plaster-like lacing head on a virtually black, but in fact very dark chocolate brown, misty beer. Aroma of toasted walnuts, old coffee filters and cold black coffee, smoked horse meat somewhere, cigar tobacco leaves, burnt bread crust, roasted chicory, beech leaves, ashes. Cleanish onset with subdued sweetness, some old dried fig and burnt blackcurrant, dried apple peel touch, softish carb; dry indeed, with supple, lean mouthfeel. Light blood-like metallic edges round a toasty-bready, nutty and coffee-like roasted bitter middle, actual burnt cereals with an ashy touch, further bittered by spicy hops, turning quinine-like in the end even beyond the long roasted bitterness. Very dry stout indeed, quite old school and ‘bare’ in comparison with the rest of Atrium’s output, with no extra frills – and that is just how I like my dry stout. It seems more and more of these old-fashioned roasty stouts are popping up in Western Europe lately and I can only applaud that, surely they will long outlast that sometimes very pompous (but admittedly sometimes also delicious) pastry stout fad.

Saison brewed with triticale (a hybrid of wheat and rye) fermented with wild yeasts and aged in red wine barrels. Membrane-like lacing, egg-white, moussy, medium sized head, misty yellow golden robe with ochre tinge. Aroma of ripe pear, even pineapple, white grape, fruit yoghurt, brioche bread, mandarin flesh, dessert wine, light vanilla-scenting oak wood. Sour-and-sweet onset, pineapple, pear and kumquat impressions, lively carbonated with smooth, bit vinous mouthfeel; brioche-bready core, soft and fluffy, smoothened and deepened by the wine element and dried and soured by the wild yeasts, with cucumber and gooseberry effects. Soft floral hop bitterish touch in the end along with equally soft woody tannins. Remains supple, refreshing and juicy till the end but shows the right amount of complexity one would expect from the concept behind it. Very clever and tasty beer.

Bouteille 33cl, BB 10/2024, lot# L048/21.
Brune, col blanc-cassé.
Arôme au nez plutôt anglais, malté, rétro de grains, petite touche un peu sur le moka et caramel, je retrouve peu l'impact d'Amaretto/amande.
Palais est léger avec un côté porter à l'anglaise plaisant, malt pâle, caramel, un peu toffee, léger en amande avec une petite touche de cacao en retrait, fruits noirs qui percent / mûres et encore ce côté anglais qui reste en retrait. L'amertume est un peu plus anecdotique.