Unibroue 15

Bottle. Nose-banana, phenols, musty. Beautiful gold body with a thick foamy head. Taste-light wheat and banana, black pepper, apple, lots of spice. Good spice and body all the way through. One of the best Unibroue products I have had in a long time.

The experience begins with a voluminous head in a Duvel tulip, and the scent of piquant citrus as I wait for the foam to subside. The liquid deepens; it is pale amber with glints of sunlight through milkiness -- as inviting as the Rangitikei river, into which one dips a cupped hand. The taste reveals a piquant sharpness, a soft note of low bitterness, which I hadn’t detected in either 10 or 11. The bitterness rises in pitch and intensity in the aftertaste to coat the inside of the mouth. Feeling unused to that dissonance might lead me to give 15 a bad review if I were simply expecting an iteration of 10. But perhaps the bitterness is created deliberately by the use of select hops; perhaps 15 was intended to be different. The same drinkable quality, the same alcohol-suffused lemon lightness, with a consistency that manages to be full without being heavy, is present in this beer as in previous incarnations. But nostalgia aside, I must conclude that its quality overall still falls behind the rest. I sampled 10, 11 and 15 recently and came to the same conclusion: 10 really is the best, with 11 still exemplary and 15 trailing at some distance. Leagues better than most breweries’ offerings, but not sufficiently superb to slake my thirst for 10 or 11, 15 will do. Perhaps it will do far better wth age, when sampled again next year.

750mL bottle: Dated: Jan 6/2006. Pours a light amber translucent color, very fizzy, very fine bubbles. Smallish head, somewhat diminsiahing, very fine bubbles. Very sugary, fruity aroma, grapes, some pineapple, floraly. Very sweet, flowery taste, grapes, some of that pineapple taste, but only some. Very fizzy mouthfeel, warming, very sweet. Cellering longer might do this better.

Bottle shared by Blake. Clear orange-amber body with a thick foamy head suspended by continuous carbonation. Zippy aroma - fresh ginger, bready yeast, spicy thyme, and alcohol pepper all over creamy-sweet pale malt. Very enticing. The flavor packs a healthy amount of green pepper alcohol. This along with some stemmy hops and dry malt make up the baseline flavor while bready, fruit-estery (green apple and pineapple) yeast ride on top. The finish leaves you with bread dough, pepper skin and leaf. Lots of flavors in this guy but again the belgian-stylings fail to reel me in. Too much alcohol, too.

01/06/2006 born on date. Pours to a glowing 24k gold body with an everlasting fluffy white head. Nice visible carbonation. Nice lacing. The aroma is very yeasty. Bready, spicy, yeasty, light pepper, apples, pears. The flavor is lemon zest, yeasty like a saison, dry malt, black pepper, a little harsh. The palate is definitely warming, spicy, but easy drinking. Medium-light body.

(bottle - corked & caged 750 ml) Nice golden color with a thick and puffy white head. Aroma is rich and full of yeast, malts, and some esters. The flavor is very well balanced with lots of warm yeasty and spicy notes. The finish is very warming and dry with a nice yeasty and spice aftertaste. Very well blended and very easy to drink for 10%.

Sampled from magnum bottle. Pours murky yellow-gold with a scattered white head. Aroma is dominated by esters from the Unibroue yeast. Much like their other beers - so you like it or you don’t by now (this is their 15th anniversary ale). Flavor is well-balanced and dominated by the yeast as well (clove, pepper, apples, pears) with a dry, tart finish. In sum, the beer is enjoyable if you like the Unibroue yeast. It is, therefore, not unique, but uniquely Unibroue.

While ugly - dull beige with a loose head - and smelling mainly of foot, mushroom and stiff alcohol, this isn’t bad at all. The full body shows a lively dance between coriander, green peppercorn and dried sichuan pepper skins versus alcohol, over a backdrop of warm and doughy thick pale malts.