Alengrin
Ghent, Belgium 🇧🇪 MemberOptions
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Alengrin
updated a beer:
Duvel Barrel Aged - Irish Whiskey Edition
brewed by Duvel Moortgat
1 month ago
Alengrin
updated a beer:
Duvel Barrel Aged - Kentucky Bourbon Edition
brewed by Duvel Moortgat
1 month ago
Appearance - 7 | Aroma - 7 | Flavor - 8 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 8.5
Blend of (the revived) Eylenbosch cherry lambic with Alvinne's Chain Reaction, a blonde sour making use of raw wheat in an attempt at emulating lambic, but also flavoured with fig leaf; this is a collab I never saw coming, I must admit, but apparently it arose when both Alvinne and Eylenbosch were invited together for a tap takeover at Internationella Pressklubben, the famed Swedish beer restaurant. From those kegged origins back in April, the blend has meanwhile been bottled in 37.5 cl 'geuze bottles' with cork and muselet - luckily. Medium thick, fizzing, irregularly moussey, pale pink-white head dissolving quickly in the middle but retaining at the edges; cloudy fuchsia red robe with rosy tinge, the colour of a strawberry daiquiri, but more tilted towards burgundy. Strong and distinct bouquet of rich cherry jam and reduced sour cherry juice, slight cherry vinegar, sour yoghurt, old leather, wet oak wood, damp earth, stewed rhubarb, almond from the cherry stones, cherry skins, rosé wine gone sour, dark green forest weeds, indeed whiffs of both coconut and cinnamon as announced (but even then I was not actually expecting them) but also cesspool as more of the bottle goes into the glass (slowly retreating again after that, fortunately). Sharp onset from both puckering cherry tartness and spritzy carbon dioxide, lemony streaks for sure but no real 'vinegar' effect, just an aromatic touch of cherry vinegar perhaps; unripe green plum and hard green apple notes as well. Lots of sour cherry fleshiness along with astringent cherry skin tannins, piercing through a soft bready wheatiness and yoghurty lactic sourness throughout, adding layers of wood, earthiness and cherry stone tannins in the end, while a full-bodied red wine aspect lingers in the background. Retronasally, the fig leaf that went into the Alvinne part of this blend does push through as a slight exotic accent, but far less reminiscent of cinnamon and coconut retronasally than orthonasally. Drying, tart, long, tannic, almondy and lemony finish - but also filled with this 'rosy' cherry fleshiness and juiciness, also contributing to a flavour profile which generally feels a bit more intense than average for a cherry lambic. Alvinne fans will probably not be disappointed here - I am less certain about the Eylenbosch fans which are probably a tad more traditionally oriented, but this is in any case a very colourful, tangy and distinct fruit sour, recommended at least for the true sour beer aficionado.
Alengrin
updated a beer:
Cherry of Eden
brewed by Brouwerij Eylenbosch (2019 - ... )
1 month ago
Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 8 | Flavor - 7.5 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 7.5
DVDK's dark barleywine - which I recall made an impression on me when it was first released in its regular form back in 2012 - aged partially on Italian wine barrels (yes, the famed Brunello) and partially on bourbon barrels; from a bottle of around one and a half years old I found at the Delhaize supermarket in the Dok Noord complex, a commercial redevelopment of an old industrial site at the old harbour docks in the northeast of Ghent. I had never visited this particular supermarket before (though I heard that they sell Dok Brewing Company beers cheaper than Dok itself, located less than two hundred yards further south on the same site), but I must admit I was stunned by their range of beers, some of which I not only never saw in another supermarket, but were also completely new to me. Thinnish and quickly breaking but regularly shaped, greyish off-white, tiny-bubbled head, forming a ring and some flat islands over an initially clear but quickly hazed, warm chestnut brown robe with terracotta- to ochre-shifting hue. Aroma of caramel sauce, lots of oaky vanilla, fortified wine 'à la' sweet sherry or sweet madera, bittersweet bourbon, port, cake, nougat, blue plum, 'kramiek', toffee, dried blueberries, molasses, dark candi sugar (strong), hints of champagne, almond, ripe pear, biscuit, vague chicory and peanut butter. Sweet onset in a dried-fruit way, somewhat 'trail mix'-like effect perhaps, fig, date, raisin, pear, dried apricot and prune, all sprinkled with dark candi sugar, extending its sweetness over a moderately carbonated, smooth and somewhat vinous body of layers of toffee, hazel- and peanut, bread pudding and slight toast, increasingly warmed by bittersweet bourbon and 'grapey' Brunello; the bourbon, however, far overpowers the wine, even if this refined, fortified wine-like, almost liqueurish effect keeps lingering, perhaps even conquering the bourbon in the very end - difficult to say, as this confrontation of flavours is overclouded by dark malts (both sweet and bitter but the sugar accentuates the sweetness - until a peanutty effect unexpectedly comes to the foreground long after swallowing!), very pronounced oak wood effects (vanilla!) and aromatic side effects of yeasty spiciness (clove), something very lightly 'meaty' (proteins) and soft floral hops. The fortified wine effect is very strong in this one, and is probably just the simple effect of Brunello being fortified by bourbon; under this strong and dominant effect, a slick dark beer resides which hovers somewhere in between quadrupel and actual Anglo-Saxon barleywine, tilted much more to the first than to the latter in my opinion (going for other Ensemble variants as well, of course). Rich, layered beer, but perhaps in a more subtle and 'hidden' way than most seem to expect; the ABV, however, is unnecessarily high for me, 9-10% would have done the job just as well, but that is just my personal opinion. In any case, this is one demanding sipper for a night even colder than this one - I should have waited for a month or more to open it, but could not resist. In short: adequate barleywine vibes in a Belgo-Dutch kind of way with dominant fortified wine-like effect - and sweeter than expected, too.
gave a cheers!
Alengrin has a new beer style achievement
Level 26 for IPA ticks with a total of 1600 ticks of this master style.
DDH Hopheart IPA from Ārpus Brewing Co. was the one that did it!
1 month ago
Alengrin (11561) reviewed DDH Hopheart IPA from Ārpus Brewing Co. 1 month ago
Appearance - 7 | Aroma - 8 | Flavor - 8 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 7
One of countless hazy IPAs by this familiar and trusted Latvian craft brewery, now hopped with Vic Secret, Mosaic and Galaxy; can from the Albert Heijn supermarket in the Arteveldestadion in Ghent. Foamy, inches thick, egg-white, dense, creamy, 'Brugse kant'-like lacing, rocky head gradually thinning and eventually breaking, on a cloudy yellow blonde robe with apricot tinge - almost opaque, but not murky. Predictable but still beguiling aroma of lime zest, a blossoming mandarin orchard, fresh lemongrass, granadilla, green guava, papaya, honeydew, cucumber peel, freshly cut green bell pepper, meringue, mangosteen, fresh cake dough, celery salt, diesel. Aromatically sweet-fruity onset, all from hops of course as usual in this style, a wave of papaya, mandarin blossoms, pomelo, lychee, guava and mangosteen, prickly carbonated but with very small bubbles so still feeling creamy; fresh lemon cake dough-y 'soil' drenched in a huge aromatic, tropical hoppiness, adding granadilla and lemongrass to all the guava, papaya and pomelo - retronasally at least, where a hint of sweaty dankness also appears. Its bitterness remains refinedly citrusy and does not disturb the sweet aromatics at all, in fact it only complements them, penetrating the malts - including soapy wheat and velvety oats - to their core, as it ought to be. I am far from the world's most avid NEIPA fan - in fact I already grew tired of their overkill years ago - but this does not leave me completely indifferent, to answer the brewery's statement; especially the fact that I can obtain these beers from a fifteen minutes car ride to a supermarket nearby still baffles me, if I look back at what the beer world has become in the quarter of a century in which I have been following it closely.
Appearance - 7 | Aroma - 7.5 | Flavor - 7.5 | Texture - 7 | Overall - 7.5
Amber ale of sorts (the brewery does not specify the intended style) honouring the puffins or 'clowns of the sea' populating the islands north of Scotland, including the Orkneys, which gave us beerlovers the great Orkney brewery, one of Scotland's trusted classics. Bottle from the Tesco (I think) in Aberdeen and my last souvenir of the holiday I had there in August. Medium thick, moussey, 'Brugse kant'-like lacing, slightly greyish off-white, largely stable head on a clear, deep pure amber coloured robe with darker bronze tinge - a beauty in terms of colour, in my personal view. Aroma of wet toast, burnt hazelnuts, dried wormwood and dandelions, vague dried (faded) grapefruit peel, old mace, moist white pepper, chicory, walnut skin, cigarette shag, dried medlar, shriveled apple peel, unsugared hazelnut paste and slight butter. Dried-fruity onset, sweetish but not actually sweet, hinting at dried medlar, dried fig and dried apple peel, all restrained and softly carbonated with a somewhat creamy mouthfeel - 'fuller' even than expected at this ABV. Toasty-bitter maltiness fills the middle, with a slight 'non-sweet' caramelly side and a nutty core; the malt bitterness vastly overshadows whatever little sweetness is in it, and a very potent dosage of leafy, spicy, even wormwoody hops only extends this bitterness - in a very pronounced way, to the point where only the hop bitterness remains stuck to the tongue's root long after swallowing the last drop. English style 'best bitter' with a Scottish ale (80/-) influence in the malt department and a more severe bitterness in the hop department than is typical for a best bitter - which is why the brewery refrains from any style classification I guess, but as a Belgian, this does not frustrate me (too much)... In either case a fairly rich, tangy, characterful beer, representing the Orkney brewery proudly. Enjoyed it, also as a last tangible remainder of an interesting holiday in Scotland.
Appearance - 7 | Aroma - 3 | Flavor - 4 | Texture - 5 | Overall - 2
Sweet, light 'kriek' based on wheat beer, something Huyghe has been doing since the nineties (Floris Griotte), branded exclusively for the Marks & Spencer supermarkets - I bought my sample at the one in Aberdeen (Union Square). Medium thick, frothy, pale lilac-pink, slowly opening head on a deep and bright ruby red beer with vermillion tinge. Aroma of candied cherries and Haribo 'Dubbele Kersen', grenadine or red lemonade, industrial cherry jam, bubblegum, perhaps a vague background note of white bread crumbs. Utterly sweet, sugary onset as expected, full of stick red cherry candy instead of real cherries, the infamous 'poepegatjes' flavour but still a tad less sticky than some others in this genre, with an underlying sourish touch feeling lemonade-like (but of course not natural at all). Lively carb, slick and thinnish body mostly 'filled' with sugar cloying to the teeth; a very flimsy wheaty soapiness is noticeable under all that red candy, but otherwise I cannot find anything even remotely beery in it. Sticky sweet red candy finish - nothing different from the flavour 'parcours' that preceded it. This is the old Floris Griotte (which I effectively once had more than two decades ago - never though I would ever need it again as a reference so much time later), but even further simplified, further sweetened to compete with that godawful 'rouge' hype and further removed from actual cherry flavours towards industrial red candy flavours. I suspect this has happened to the actual Griotte as well, now called Floris Kriek, in which the Florisgaarden witbier that served as a base was intentionally kept light and restrained in flavour so that this fruit beer range could be built on it. Given how Huyghe is close by from Ghent where I live, I may even go out to find a present-day Floris Kriek just for science... In any case finding a Belgian "zoete kriek" on the shelves of Marks & Spencer drew my attention so I could not resist buying it - my curiosity has been amply satisfied now, sadly not in a good way. Curiosity killed the cat, as the saying goes.
Appearance - 7 | Aroma - 8 | Flavor - 7.5 | Texture - 7 | Overall - 7.5
Coffee-flavoured Dutch style Doppelbock by Uiltje - indeed the Dutch 'bokbieren' season is upon us again and it has been a long time since I joined this tradition, which is almost exclusively responsible for the revival of Dutch beer culture in the late 20th century, before the advent of U.S.-inspired craft brewing in the early 21st century. Can from Albert Heijn. Thick, regular, quite dense and rather creamy, audibly fizzing, pale yellowish beige, pillowy head gradually breaking on a clear, deep mahogany brown robe, dark but with fiery copper-red glow when held against the light, showing lots of visible sparkling. Aroma of caramel candy, indeed coffee powder coming in second, toast, brandy, fig, raisin bread, toffee, hints of damp autumn leaves, old dry chestnuts, cinnamon, marmite, pear, black peppercorns, brown bread dough, pond water. Rounded, sweetish onset, clean and sleek dark fruitiness (as in dried fig, raisin and dried prune with a dash of pear), actively but finely prickling carbonation, smooth full body. Caramelly to lightly toffeeish, brown-bready malt core, sweetish but not too outspokenly sweet, instead quite quickly bittered by strong coffee powder, both aromatically and flavour-wise, yet working well with autumn-leafy, somewhat earthy hops, toasty malt bitterness taking over from the caramel and a soothing, soft afterglow of brandy-like alcohol with a touch of clove trailing behind. Smooth and slick, clean but in that sense very typical Doppelbock in all respects - the addition of coffee, which has been done quite generously here, sets it apart, even if it is not the first Dutch 'koffiebok' (in itself of course a whim of postmodern craft brewing as all the classic 'bokbieren' were clean and unflavoured with herbs or things like that). Fit for a benign October night - tasty, very malty and warming, with an 'autumny' feel to it. Uiltje still produces likeable beers despite the Heineken takeover so I for one am not ready yet to let them go...