Saison de Pipaix

Brewed by Brasserie à Vapeur
Style: Saison
Leuze-Pipaix, Belgium

Serve in Tulip

1995 bottle. Lovely golden colour, white head with light lacing. Intense aroma of apples, yeast and spice. A little must on the backbeat. Tart flavour indeed, very sour fruit with harsh afternotes. Perhaps I can’t appreciate a good Saison, or perhaps I hit a bad bottle, although Numenor may think otherwise.

1995 vintage -- Nice golden body with no head. Excellent tart aroma, sour from ageing with nice spices. Awesome tart body with sweet citrus accents, some light bread as well. Tart and sour ending, very enjoyable.

750ml - Secret Santa July 06 - Aroma is very yeasty and spicy. Pours cloudy orange with a medium head and great lacing. Flavor is sour citrus, bread dough, and spice. Palate is carbonated and tart. Interesting and tasty.

UPDATED: NOV 6, 2007 Wild card choice from Utobeer. Not fully aquainted with saisons, so an uneducated impression at best. Reddish orange in colour with thin head and a bit of lacing. Great big nose of apples - both sweet and sour. Taste of sour cherries, apples and balsamic vinegar. Dry finish. Light carbonation and medium body pairs nicely with the other cider-like qualities. Nice, but a bit sickly
*Re-rate - Vintage bottle at DHVL with Duff, Mes and Harrisoni. Was maybe a little past it’s prime but Duff and I enjoyed it regardless. Had an almost lambic, sour ale nose. Hops and spice with a kind of vineous quality in the flavour and some hints of liquorice. Enough to bump the numbers up slightly

750mL no date. Pours a clear orange with a moderate off-white head. Aroma is of sour fruits, almost vinegary and muted sawdust. Taste is also quite sour, some cherries, again with strong vinegar acidity. I can pick up on a little pepper, some slight mint in the background. I’m getting no ginger, etc. I’m pouring the rest of this one out. I just hope it was a bad bottle, though I won’t be spending 9 bucks again to find out.

Fruity orange and tangerine with lots of spices in the very strong and fresh aroma with subtle caramel undertones. Cloudy copper orange in color with a tall, off-white head that thins. Initially sweet and orangish that changes to an earthy, stale and nutty malty flavor with some pithy bitterness and a mineral and chocolate touch. The orangish, spicey flavor is very dominant. Medium-light body, nice and crisp with a touch of sourness in the finish. Perhaps a little too spiced?

Poured a hazy light pinkish amber with a creamy off white head. Aroma is all about spices, ginger and anise with some of the pepper and lichen shine through. The flavor profile starts out with a bang of lactic acid that slowly mallows allowing some of the fruity and spicy flavors to come out. Orange is quite noticable with some light ginger and pepper. The acidity of this beer is what really makes it stand out, the spicing might be a little high due to the dryness of the beer, but overall very enjoyable.

Non-vintage 750mL bottle. Of the two that I’ve had thus far, the first was nearly mouth-puckering sour (in a good way) and extremely refreshing while the second was much more subtle and complex. Pours a slightly opaque coppery orange color with a big, quickly-reducing foamy head with light pink and orange tints. The nose is light but complex, with cider vinegar, oranges, a nice earthiness, and musty, bleu cheese-like odors; black pepper as well. Very dry and sour; burning acidity and a peppery heat. Long-lasting flavors and palate. I have four more bottles of this, and I’m expecting quite large variations between each bottle. I’m not sure why this isn’t more highly rated, as I found this beer to be excellent and very complex; however, this is one of my favorite styles and a beer that I’ve been waiting a while to try, so perhaps my perceptions are skewed to my wants... Nonetheless, I think this beer is very interesting and worth trying.