St. Bernardus Abt 12

Clove and dried fruit aromas on the nose. Candy apples. Really complex. Nice. Thick, mouth-coating almost milky texture. Flavors fall a little short of the aroma and mouthfeel. A Nice flick of spice on the finish. Overall, well-done.

A light tan head with a fruity head has some honey to the palate, but not alot on the finish.

Small bottle split with Barrios courtesy of sixfootsix. Pours a murky brown with large off-white head. Nose is rich with fruit, clove, wheat. Flavors are nicely blended fruits, banana, with notes of light chocolate, and obvious alcohol, but it does not adversely affect the overall experience.

Bottle. Pours a light tan head with a murky brown body. Sticky lace. Smells of wheat, banana, yeast, and spice. Tastes of banana, honey, apple, and wheat, roast, and yeast. Don’t pick up the alcohol much.Smooth, very slight bitter medium length finish.

Pours from the bottle levying a ginormous, thick head and a dark brown colored beer. The aroma hits the nose hard with cloves, toffee and sweet dark fruit aromas (plum/raisin). Flavor is truly fantastic. The beer has a very strong alcohol kick to it but this seems to emphasis the clove flavor very well. Sweet dark fruit tones are present in the flavor and when combined with its maltiness make it a very smooth beer. Overall, the strong aroma accentuates the flavors, making them really stand out while the great lacing and long lasting head make it a visually appealing brew to drink.

My dear god, what a beer. Most notably is the palate, it coats every inch of your mouth and stays with you, adding more flavors every minute. It supplies mostly a dignified, pruney flavor common to many Belgian and Trappist ales, but this one has so more identifiable spices in the mix. It is a beautiful dark brown, cloudy. This beer is a mouthful down to the last drop.

Presentation: Drank from an 11.2 oz bottle, poured into Watou brewery chalice. Bottle has a drawing of a balding monk with a very good beer in his hand. Appearance: In my limited experience, this sets the standard for strong dark ales. A deep orange-brown color, almost completely opaque. The head never really disappears from the top of the beer. Smell: This beer smells better than the smell of any other beer which my nose has smelled. Smells like fresh bread, with strong malty tones. Taste: This is possibly the best-tasting beer I’ve tried to date. If I go fat and bald from drinking this beer, it’s worth the price. God bless the monks from Westvleteren, who apparently created the recipe for this beer. God bless also the brewers at Watou who make this intense stuff. The beer is full-bodied, and leaves a coating in your mouth (a good thing). I’m not that good at picking out individual flavors, but I can taste sweet fruity flavors (plums, grapes, and bananas) with malt (chocolate and bread). I poured this below the temperature recommended on the bottle (52-56°F), and I think the taste becomes more intense as the liquid warms.

Huge gushing cinnamon head that descends slowly. Initial notes of raisin, sweet barley sugar, dark stone fruits and a slighty musty mushroom fragrance. As the beer warms further this complex aroma comes to the forefront. Colour is an almost opaque chocolate and coffee brown with only mild translucency at the margins of the glass. Tastes are initially dark woods, raisins, molasses, very sweet fruits and slighty aggressive alcoholic highlights that leave a pleasantly warm sensation behind the eyes. The mouth feel is very enjoyable - the sweetness coats the mouth like dissolving fairy floss. Subjectively, the potent sugars make this brew a strong competitor to the Trappist Rochefort (in which this aspect is more restrained), but the St Bernardus is still a delightful ale.