Chouffe Houblon Dobbelen IPA Tripel

750ml bottle (though I fell in love with it on tap at the Bulldog NE). Pours a hazy golden color with an absolutely huge, billowy head. Aroma is light but complex, with an overall character of sweetness and earthiness with smells of citrus, hops, and yeast. Taste is medium-bodied and well carbonated, with a flavor of hoppy citrus tones, spice, and sweet fruit and a very crisp cider-like finish. An outstanding IPA in all respects with a unique and likable character.

Bottle. Pours golden color with a huge pillowy white head with hue lacing. Aroma is sweet light malts, fruity, estery. Flavor is floral hops, citrus notes, light malts. Palate is medium to light, highly carbonated, finishes dry and assertive, crisp and spicy. This is a great variation on the tripel style. Nice summer brew. Very crisp, dry, and refreshing, alcohol is well hidden behind a blast of dry hoppiness. Great stuff.

Name: Houblon Chouffe Dobbelen IPA Belgian Triple
Date: 05/12/2006
Mode: Draft
Source: Brick Store Pub

cloudy dark yellow, big fine white head, solid lace, sweet spicy malt aroma, big spicey flavor, nice aged hop character, enough malt to back it up, all about the spices and the hops, really excellent

Aroma: 7/10; Appearance: 8/10; Flavor: 7/10; Palate: 7/10; Overall: 15/20
Rating: 3.7/5.0
Drinkability: 8/10
Score: **4

750mL bottle. Batch #3. Best before: end 2009. Pours a hazy straw with tons of floaties and a massive off-white head that leaves big chunks of lacing. Plenty of ripe, grapefruity hops in the floral aroma along with a lemony yeastiness and some vanilla. Medium body. Nice balance. Starts with some sweet, estery melon and maltiness. Finishes kinda dry. A moderate amount of warming alcohol underneath the whole way through. Solid effort.

Cloudy pale golden color with a very rocky white head. Heavy hop aroma. Flavor initially very robust hops with the expected tripel sweetness discernible in the finish. Significant lacing and a very smooth palate. Takes some getting used to but a pretty good beer overall.

Pale, cloudy yellow with a big and lasting white head. Rich fruity aroma where Belgian yeast and American hops come together in a perfect blend, in particular with notes of pineapple, tangerine and peach. Dry and fruity flavour. Hop flavour and bitterness is a good match for the tripel character that I sometimes find cloying.

At first this gem I got from the NEPA case split club seemed mislabeled as I wanted to know where the hops were hiding. But they are in the aroma and have a pleasant grapefruity streak in the flavor. But the almost trademark Chouffe yeast and malty flavors rule the day even though I have to say both hops and malts are well blended and balanced. There is a slight sour aftertaste going on but it doesn’t diminish the overall experience heavily.

Bottle at the Chris o shindig. Melon, musk, blackberry and cinnamon aroma. Light melon sweetness, clean, fresh, good chewy hops appear after a pause. Much more delicate than the abv would indicate. Nice.