Alengrin
Ghent, Belgium 🇧🇪 MemberOptions
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Alengrin (11609) reviewed De Karper In De Badkuip from De Kromme Haring 4 months ago
Appearance - 7 | Aroma - 7.5 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 8
Dark lager in Czech style brewed according to the old double decoction method to achieve more authenticity, in itself already a praiseworthy effort by this accomplished Dutch craft brewery, in this case collaborating with 'my hometown brewery' Dok. Can from De Hopduvel in Ghent. Thick and frothy, moussey, pale greyish beige, very silently crackling, membrane-lacing, firm head on a clear, dark mahogany brown robe with copper-red glow. Aroma of dried out brown bread, wood ashes, charred toast, haemoglobin, dried fig, touch unripe pear, old walnut, hints of earth and autumn leaves. Spritzy onset, minerally and lively carbonation but fine-bubbled, swirling through restrained dried-fruity touches (dried fig or pear) with a haemoglobin-like edge moving into a rounded, smooth, somewhat 'fluffy' body of toasty, brown-bread-crusty and roasted bitter (chicory) maltiness, ending a tad ashy and coffee grounds-like with an additional leafy hop bitter note. Minerally, 'blood-like' and ashy side effects linger around. Černé (black) rather than tmavé (brown), perhaps, with all that roastiness and almost black hue, feeling 'fuller' and more layered than the average Czech černé, which in itself only illustrates how skilled, experienced and talented De Kromme Haring is. Their name is always one of the first to pop up in my head when asked about the most accomplished contemporary Dutch breweries and this 'bath tub carp-černé' only confirms this - though knowing Dok's dedication to covering all styles, techniques and ingredients in existence, I bet they were the ones insisting on using double decoction for this one...
Appearance - 7 | Aroma - 7 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 7 | Overall - 7
The eighteenth one already in this still expanding series of beers devoted to the former mining industry in Limburg, this time a hybrid of blonde beer and white wine, infused with grape juice, fermented with Portuguese wine yeast, 'aged' on oak chips and hopped with Nelson Sauvin (known for its associations with Sauvignon Blanc). Intricately 'Brugse kant'-like lacing, snow white, medium thick, regular and stable head over an initially crystal clear, pale golden blonde beer with vague greenish tinge and thin, disparate sparkling, turning lightly misty with sediment. Aroma of unripe pineapple, green pear, grape skins more than grape juice, white peach, light but clear 'oaky' vanillin indeed, spumante, dry straw, apple peel, clove, dried chamomile, wet gravel, something annoyingly rubbery in the background. Fizzy onset, minerally, with 'yellow' fruitiness swirling around in a not overly sweet way - white peach, unripe pineapple, green banana, hard pear. Supple, smooth body, slick cereally-grainy pale maltiness indeed 'flavoured' with something - first the grape juice adding a fruitiness and juiciness without becoming dominant, and then, more outspokenly, the vanilla-ish character of the oak chips. Nelson Sauvin hops indeed add a background whiff of fruitiness - all too subtly so in my opinion - as well as a grassy, somewhat spicy but altogether mild, slowly 'spreading' end bitterness, in which a light tannic effect from the grape juice and the oak chips can be felt. Lingering 'yellow-white' fruitiness as well as somewhat pronounced 4-vinyl-guaiacol retronasally, the latter adding a clove-like effect which in my view clashes a bit with the white wine effects they tried to incorporate here. Reminds me a bit of Château d'Ychouffe and the like, but the wine factor is far less outspoken here, even though a dryish-fruity white wine flavour does linger on the tongue even minutes after swallowing; not being a great fan of beer-wine hybrids and blends, for me personally this is probably a good thing. Altogether decent, but a bit 'rubbery' and phenolic and therefore short of greatness, as usual with these Kompel beers.
Alengrin
added a new beer
Nostalgia Collection #18 - Het Ketelhuis
by
Brouwerij Kompel
4 months ago
Alengrin
updated a beer:
Libs Lager Beer
brewed by Libs Brasserie
4 months ago
Alengrin
updated a beer:
Ritter Export
brewed by Brauerei Brinkhoff
4 months ago
Alengrin
updated a beer:
Schlappeseppel
brewed by Eder & Heylands Brauerei
4 months ago
Alengrin
updated a beer:
Adler Dort
brewed by Haacht
4 months ago
Alengrin
updated a beer:
Ypra Hoppy Alcoholfree
brewed by Brouwerij Omer Vander Ghinste (Bockor)
4 months ago
Alengrin (11609) reviewed Alkoholfrei 0,0% from Warsteiner 4 months ago
Appearance - 7 | Aroma - 5 | Flavor - 6 | Texture - 2 | Overall - 5.5
The non-alcoholic version of this big but still independent German brand, from a can mentioning "< 0.5% alcohol" rather than exactly 0% - 0.5% being the upper limit of what can still legally be sold as alcoholfree, in Germany but also in the Low Countries. Snow white, medium thick, slowly thinning but largely stable head over a crystal clear warm 'old golden' beer with strings of visible sparkling. Aroma of breakfast cereals, white bread sticks, papier maché, wet cotton, grass, plaster, minerals. Smooth cereally onset, somewhat sweetish and rounded, almost white-bready, feeling quite 'pure' but also very monotonous and a tad watery, with sparkling water-like vibes, with a persistent minerality; plaster- and wet white paper-like flavours, something soapy even, but also a grassy hop bittering note in the end, lending more 'fullness' to the finish than it actually has - for the better, of course. Inoffensive, thinnish and bland, but the little flavour that is in here, does match what I expect from a non-alcoholic Pilsener; beats pioneer Clausthaler in that respect, for me at least, even though that same annoying rubbery flavour lingers after swallowing that not just Clausthaler but many other German (and other) alcohol-free pale lagers have.
Alengrin
updated a beer:
Bim Bam Invergordon Whisky BA
brewed by Holy Beer House
4 months ago