De Graal Speciale

750mL bottle, courtesy of argo0. Thanks, Aaron! Pours a murky brown color with golden edges; thin light-tan head with patchy lacing. Basic yeastiness, nougat, and chewy brown sugar in the aroma. Medium-to-full mouthfeel: average, slightly sharp carbonation; brown sugar, basic maltiness, and dark fruits; very basic malt character overall (theme of the evening so far). Touch of chocolate and toasted malts coming through in the finish.

Bottle Bonus from Papsoe shared with jasonp and Maniac and my girlfriend Cyn. Pours orange with a half finger tan head. Nose is sweet. Taste is sweet and very nice and overall pretty good.

33cl, from De Hopduvel Gent, complex brew, hazy, good head, good Winter brew

Bottle with a best before end date of 6/2009 and the label says 8.5ABV. Tan fizzy small head that mostly expired, virtually no lacing, hazy, no visible carbonation, and a reddish brown hue on the first pour and a brown hue on the second pour. The aroma was malty, caramel, brown sugar, sweet, dark and dried fruits, and spicy. Ditto for the flavor with some light chocolate and finished semi-dry. Sprite, bubbly mouthfeel and medium bodied. Quaffable for the style, easy to drink, not one of the better beers of this style but worthy of a try nonetheless.

Brown with slight ruby tint...small swirling bubbles. Aroma of plum juice, ginger, tobacco, roasted malts. Rich malt taste with slight bitter chocolate, cocoa milk, carob, cherries, phenols, white pepper, liquorice. I like the De Graal and drank it many times in Belgium before it was imported. They’re unique and a tad strange, but enjoyable also.

Dark amber colour. Pale brown head. A quite mild taste. Not too much sweetness. Not very special beer.

Thanks Weep for the bottle. It just falls short, very thin in the middle and missing a lot of the caramel sweetness that should be there to round out the beer. Not bad but falls short of what it could be, nothing worth searching for.

A hazy dark brown colored beer, with a nice beige foamy head. An aroma of roasted malts. There are also some notes of coffee and sweets. The taste is fruity and malty, with some spicey accents. A good beer. It’s sadly the last brew, I bought this decembre 2007.