Castelain Blond Biere

Brewed by Brasserie Castelain
Style: Bière de Garde
Benifontaine, France

Pale yellow body(blond) fills the snifter, almost clear with a deceptive short-lasting head. Obviously bottle-conditioned, coarse sediments are everywhere in suspension from the beginning of the pour, it's almost ridiculous. Aroma is pleasant straw (I wouldn't combine those 2 words usually, but this seemed like a good fit with the ensemble), light field hops. The sniff would gain a lot from being more intense. Fruity Biere de Garde: peaches and apples endow the tongue together with caramelic malts and subtle flowery hops. The finish is sweet like a pears pie. Body is medium and creamy. Nicely done beer, certainly not world-class, but like any Biere de Garde, this has a definite cachet to me, besides being effortlessly drinkable.

As full of yeast chunks as stars in the night sky of a moonless night...Fresh cereal perfume the large, open field, as lavish flowers grow through a dry bread crumb soil...Musty pears lead us out wishing we could have stayed longer to better appreciate its depths...

Whispy, white head. Tight packed bubbles. Moderate amount of carbonation, Kind of a yeasty/lager aroma, different. Sweet and flat tasting. Nothing special or complex.

Little head with a nice light orange cloudy colour. The nose is awesome and totally unsuspected. Bannannaish, maltish, and invigorating nose. Also, this is very smoothe to the mouth.

Poured a cloudy golden color with a small creamy, fizzly head with no lacing. It had a sweet apple, light fruit aroma, there was also some carbonation in the aroma. Had a somewhat old taste, slight carbonation, mild apple, spice dry finish.

Pours a hazy golden with a large puffy white head and plenty of lace. Subtle malty and Belgian yeasty aroma. Light sugary body, perhaps too sweet. Dry bitter flavor toward the end. Not a bad Biere de Garde, but could use some balance and complexity.

Subtle light caramelly malt aroma with a light citrus ester hint (no hop aroma) and faint mustiness. Beautiful bright golden straw color with funky chunky yeast sediment unless you very carefully decant. Light carbonatation and bright acidity complements light caramel malt flavor and green apple esters with very slight alcohol spicyness. Soft, persistent bitterness rounds out a lingering slighly dry finish. Nice.

App: light gold,no head(although I didn't get to pour it myself, even swirling the glass didn't produce much foam) Aro:Floral, musty, carmelized malt Palate:nice and easy Flavor:malt with spicy yeast notes...didn't notice much alcohol. Overall:it comes together nicely, sweet, spicy, floral, malty. But as others have said "good but not great"