Bornem Triple

Brewed by Brouwerij Van Steenberge
Style: Abbey Tripel
Ertvelde, Belgium

Serve in Trappist glass, Tulip

Poured from bottle - Belgian sampler. Smells just like white wine. Cloudy, wheat-like appearance, with persistent, whipped cream head. Flavor, at first, seems like a beer/wine hybrid, malt and grape notes compete with each other. The Beigian ale qualities arrive about 1/3 of the way in, with notes of yeast, bread, banana, alcohol and spice appearing and taking over. Tastes better with each sip. Finishes with you wanting more.

Somewhat muted aroma, what’s there is lightly musty and yeast-smokey. I liked the throwback label. LIghtly hazy yellow, big white cushiony head which lasted a couple of minutes and then sublimed away quickly. Astringent, chemical, dry, very fizzy. Some light sourness. Nothing doing here, didn’t do well back-to-back with the Augustijn, which was a much sturdier. Medium body, finishes out with a lagerish nastiness. There’s actually a chance that this beer may have gotten some bad yeasties in it, but I wouldn’t count on it. A bit cidery-sour on the lips.

Cloudy amber color with a decent sized foamy head. Malty aroma with banana flavors. The strong alcohol is present but not overpowering.

Cloudy golden body. Huge head retention. I had to wait a long time for it to settle down. Yeasty banana esters along with orange and a medicinal quality. The nice thing about the huge head phenomenon is that it forces you to let the beer warm up (a good thing for belgians as this releases more flavor). I was a little let down by the flavor. Slightly sour and some bitterness, but not the type usually enjoyed in a hoppy beer and not typical for this style. A little rough and unrefined, and can taste too much of the alcohol. There are better examples of the tripel style out there.

Pours golden in colour with a persistant white head. Aromas of alcohol, apples and belgian yeast. The taste is all alcohol at first, with some yeast flavours kicking in as it warmed, it also had a bitterness(not good) like jalanga root or something, weird fizzy carbonation. Not a good beer.

UPDATED: SEP 14, 2007 Bottled 0,33 [Old Buccaneer Reserve].
Compact and adherent head, good persistence. Yellow gold color, good fizz, dense and fraught. Alcoholic and aged scent with wine cellar notes, yeast, must and wine. Prickly and full bodied taste, dense, warm, structured and winy. Decidedly alcoholic but rather balanced and pleasant.

I’ve never had a beer that smelled like this. After looking at about a dozen other ratings, I think Irishboy summed it up best: "spiced apple and some tartness". There’s also a funkiness that’s hard to describe. It’s a mix between stale leather, stone smoke and sweaty socks. Hazy gold with a huge frothy, white head. Artistic lace. As cbkschubert said, couldn’t pour the whole bottle into the glass because the head was so big. Dried apple profile. Very dry for a 9% tripel. Not flawed, however. Would make for a good summer refresher, but at 9%, you’d only want one! Not a bad brew. Has some unique qualities, but just doesn’t cut it when there are so many better tripels out there. Loses key points for aroma. Simply not overly flavorful.

(330 ml bottle from Belfast Co-op) Pours cloudy light, pale peachy-yellow with about 1 1/2" of soft, meringuey white head that recedes to about 1/2" and stays. Aroma is initially sour but then turns sweeter, almost getting a brown-sugary malty sweet aroma along with some light citrus and other pleasant stuff. Interesting. Mouthfeel is super soft, almost silky, lightly fizzy. Flavor lightly lemony-citrus with some breadiness, sweeter malt and fairly rich yeast flavor. Pretty nice, quite complex and great palate.