Dieu du Ciel Dernière Volonté

Brewed by Dieu du Ciel
Style: Belgian Ale
Montreal, Canada

Slightly hazy golden with a lasting white head. Great yeasty aroma, with tropical fruits and complex spices, flowers and a little malt note. Dry and spicy flavour with grassy hops and a nice bitter finish. Pretty much the perfect Belgian blonde ale

Bottle. Pours turbid dull golden with orangy edges and 2 fingers of fluffy, white head. Aroma is rock sugary malt, floral spice, mild yeasty funk, orange zest, and black pepper. THe taste is very black peppery, with a solid dose of orange zest, rock sugary malt, and floral yeast. Finishes bone dry, and the complexity of flavor never diminishes. This one is outstanding.

Blonde beer with a rather floral hops aroma, almost pot-like. Extreme hops with slices of grapefruits and resins with a nice scotch like aftertaste, like a wonderful liqueur with hops.

Bottle. Head is initially large, frothy, white, mostly lasting. Body is hazy medium yellow, bottle conditioned. Aroma is lightly malty (toasted grain), moderately to heavily hoppy (resin, herbs, grapefruit), lightly yeasty (cobwebs), with notes of pepper, gum, dried pineapple, alcohol. Flavor is moderately sweet, lightly to moderately acidic, lightly to moderately bitter. Finish is lightly sweet, lightly to moderately acidic, moderately bitter. Medium body, velvety texture, lively carbonation, lightly alcoholic. Tainted by overly aggressive hops of the wrong variety, which threatens to clobber what’s Belgian about it. Pity, because otherwise it’s a solid beer. I would expect this sort of treatment from a west coast American brewer, but DDC? Odd.

Draught sample at the Mondial. Pale, rather oily blonde with a bit of lasting snowy head...soft aroma comprised mainly of hay and honey but with underlying currents of nuts, cumin and white pepper helping to spice it up and keep in interesting...lightly yeasty body with a grainy, rough sugariness...almost feels like granular sugar has been added and not completely fermented or liquified...honey and orangey citric acid towards the finish, hops fairly muted...finishing sourness and acids don’t balance the rather cloying sweetness...interesting but relative to most DDC offerings a mixed success.

330 ml bottle. Hazy gold color with a three-finger, semi-rocky white head. Aroma is coriander, yeast, bit of pepper, and maybe hop and malt. Maybe. Medium body with smooth and creamy carbonation. Flavor: Picking up spice and a touch of banana. Hint of pepper. Floral hop. Tingles the tongue. Finishes absolutely balanced and delicious. Very fine drinking. Is everything these folks brew this good?

On tap at the brewpub. The body was cloudy orange with a white head. The aroma was grapefruit with funky brett type character. There was also some apples and cinnamon. The taste was funky with brett with some leather and apples. Interesting.

Fruity, sweet malt aroma supports strong flowery, pine-like, woody hop nose. Slightly hazy, depp golden, caramel coloured body with two finger white head that lasts nicely. Strong hops subsumed with fruity sweet malts beneath. Pleasant lasting bitterness. Body is medium with good carbonation. It’s definitely a tripel from the fruity sweetness, but the huge hops add an exciting twist. Very drinkable. On tap at the brewpub (sampled also at Mondial 2004).