Allagash Tripel Reserve

Brewed by Allagash Brewing Company
Style: Abbey Tripel
Portland, Maine USA

Batch 102. Subtle flavors. Unlike some American tripels, the tastes don’t come out strong. Otherwise, I get the typical banana and spice. Fruits. Nice. A little too much carbonation.

Bottle shared with Quevillon. The color is a hasy blond with an off white thick head. The taste is a mix of spicies, fruits and sweet fruits and also citrus fruits with that great taste of malt.The alcohol % is not that noticeable. This was one great beer.

750 ML Bottle-Batch #84-Yellow orange w/a moderate white head. Sweet Belgian Aroma. Flavor of candied sugar, yeast, spice, wheat & citrus. Has a fair amount of carbination. Easy to drink, alcohol is well hidden. Long sweet finish. Quite good.

Bomber bottle batch #103. I followed the label instructions and let this warm up to cellar temp before opening. Nice pop of the cork. It poured a cloudy golden amber color with a thin wispy head. The aroma was crisp and sweet with a fragrance of alcohol. The flavor was very nice. It started with a nice light bite and a sweetness that wasn’t overpowering. There was plenty of carbonation and a bit of a spicy taste. In all a nice combination of flavors that left you guessing at what the flavor you are tasting now was.

A 750 ml bomber with pouring instructions and a loud pop when uncorking went a long way towards reminding me of the sampling occasions of several wonderful original Tripels from Belgium. The body was cloudy yellowish orange and a lot of foam formed atop it in the tulip. The smell was a tropical forest full of flowering trees. The flavor contained banana, oranges, white pepper, cookie dough, and lemon juice. The clean and majestic taste avoided the one flaw I’ve dreaded in American versions of the style, that of being too sweet. The dusty, yeasty dryness was quite welcome and refreshing. Soothingly rich in the mouth, and well carbonated, so resounding burps abounded. The label says that this is well suited for cellaring, and it would definitely make an interesting experiment.

I had this on tap at my local, in proper glassware. It looked wonderful: a cute, foamy head with creamy, paint- like lacing over a rich honey-gold body. The aroma was strong and rich also, almost too much so--very sweet and yeasty. The taste was very strong as well and in the same way, with lots of sweet fruitiness and yeast. Hops aren’t very evident at all, but the beer does get a little more bitter the further you go into it. The kick wasn’t obvious at first, but quite powerful by the time I was done. The palate was the biggest problem for me, and the main reason I can’t make this a 4. To tell the truth, I had the same problem with this that I have had with so many hefeweizens. The palate is just way too full and bloaty for me, with much more carbonation and more yeast than I can handle comfortably. In fact, the palate was so heavy that it was hard for me to finish the glass. Combine that with a very strong kick and a very strong flavor and you have a beer that is quite a handful for many drinkers. This is a good beer, no question, and many rate it higher, but I can’t in all honesty do the same. It’s very much worth a try, especially for lovers of Belgians, but give me something a bit less bloat-provoking, please.

From a bottle poured nice light amber flavor, with a lot of head. Flavorwas light and refreshing, with a good strong finish.

750 ml, Duvel glass. Pours a delectable orange-gold with voluminous fluffy white head. Nice islands of lacing left on the glass. Nose is rather wheaty, strong lemon peel citrus, a bit of yeasty snap, grassy/hay hops, candi sugar. Rather nice and full on the palate, fluffy, very smooth towards the finish, minty hop bitterness slowly creeps up and envelops the palate. A rather nice American tripel.