De Dolle Dulle Teve Special Reserva

Formerly brewed at De Dolle Brouwers
Style: Abbey Tripel
Diksmuide, Belgium

@ Kulminator: Clear dark amber with short lasting head. Strong malty aroma with notes of ripe fruit and spices. Flavour is sweet with long sweet finish with some dryness.

Bottle @ Kulminator Deep golden with medium white head. Sweet vinious aroma with caramel, yeast and ripe fruits. Sweet flavor with malty and caramel, fruity, yeast and alcohol notes. Nice!

33cl bottle from Knightly Spirits (Orlando, FL). Pours a dark caramel brown with thin white head. Aroma is sweet malt, caramel, toffee, spice. Flavor is similar but also with notes of vinegar and sour ripe fruit. Very different from the regular Teve 10 perhaps because of the way the beer aged. Medium to full body with a sweet finish.

A rare find. Very good beer, with aging, but considerably less so than the normal Dulle Teve. There is sweet malt, apple, toffee, and enough alcohol to almost burn my nose. The flavor has candy sugar, with a vinegary presence, some acidity in the finish. For a beer this old it was a bit disappointing.

( 05 bottle, thanks Stine!) Pours a hazed orange with a white head. Aroma was very peppery, and oaky, with hints of apple skin, light yeast (not that huge bready aspect that De Dolle beers normally have), honey, and some alcohol. The flavor is quite spicy, with a lot of the bready yeast now present, and just a touch of apple skin. A solid beer, but not De Dolle’s best.

[’05 Bottle, thanks for sharing, Stine!] Pours very hazy orange with a small white head. Aroma is apple with a lot of yeast, some oak and some notes of alcohol as well. The taste is yeast dominant with light bitterness midway through and then maltiness at the very end. Good mouthfeel with a fairly dry, long and yeasty finish. I really love most De Dolle products, and while this one was good, it wasn’t quite as good as I had hoped for.

Poured from an 11.2 oz. bottle; bottled 2005. A thick bronze. Misty and heavily frothed. Soft brandy and wildflower honey aroma. A deep, fulsome tart fruit texture, that swims in caramels and bitter apple skins. Sparkling earthy pear, lacquered in vanilla extract, and a distant syrupy shade of agave, which is probably just an illusion of the greenness of the calvados character amidst the steam of alcohol. It’s nice though. It gives the the beer a sort of dingy and grimy attractiveness, like some gem of a beer unexpectedly pulled from a ratty mexican cellar.

Flavor is deep with perfumes and musty orchard colors. Warm, and expansive, if on a somewhat simple canvas of turbinado sugars, doughy honey malt and hot floral fragrance. Alcohol warmth is unresigned, but silky and spirit-forward in texture, with a smooth peppery heat. Creamy pastry-like sweetness in the heavy velvet tones of spiced oak and the grit of cotton candy. Somewhat split between the rough and the soft, though it’s hardly a struggle of extremes.

Heavy palate carried in an autumnally brisk carbonation. Pleasant. Vanilla and basic butterscotch on apples dries out the finish, at length. The age on the triple is inviting, earth-dwelling and warm, but it’s hard to determine what positive impartation the calvados barrel has lent. It always seems a little warm to me, and the gorgeously subtle malt complexity of the original gets buried a bit. Small complaints...Thanks Steve!

11.2oz. Bottled 2005. Aroma is fairly yeast driven with plenty of oak and malt as well. Just the smallest hint of calvados. Warming alcohol. Pours a fairly clear light copper with a small sustained white head. Spicy and slightly funky yeast with tart apple skin. Moderately spiced. A slight herbal quality to it as well. The alcohol escalates as the beer warms and then distracts a bit. Thicker bodied with lively carbonation and tannic wood notes on the finish. Thanks Eben!