De Ranke XX Bitter

Brewed by Brouwerij De Ranke
Style: Belgian Ale
Dottignies/Dottenijs, Belgium

Tap at The Map Room. Poured a dark, hazy gold with slight orange tinge. Head was white. The aroma consisted of a combination of tart and flora notes, reminded me of potpourri with an undertone of pine. Flavor was bitter throughout with pine notes. Highly carbonated.

Cask Stillage from the Cellar at the Milds, Stouts, Porters & Strong Ales weekend Prince Of Wales, Foxfield 06/10/2007 Hoppy and slightly yeasty aromas. Golden coloured and hazy in appearance. Hoppy and a little fruity with a crisp bitter finish.

Bottle, KW tasting, thanks Mat. Nice dry hoppy floral aroma. Neat hazy yellow, small bubbly white head. Nice taste - dry, floral, yeasty, and hoppy. Very quenching, yet complex. Excellent.

750mL bottle, KW tasting, thanks to Mat for this one. Poured a hazy straw gold with a small white head. The aroma is FLOWERS! A full beautiful bouqet of flowers, wow, it almost seemed over-powering to me. A touch of hops and some earthy aspects as well. Flavour is of dank cheese, sweet malty goodness, minor hop bitterness, but the Brett really steals the show. I almost detected some honey in the finish which was pleasant. Sort of like Orval though personally I feel it is different, and unique enough on its own they don’t have to make the comparison. Nice lingering brett yeasty aspects, gym sock, mold, etc. All those bizarre yet delicious characters I’ve come to know and love. Amazing the floral aroma was not at all apparent in the flavour. Very nice beer over-all.

draft at maproom. pours a hazy yellow with a white head. Aroma is straw, hay, grass, slightly skunky. This beer was interesting. A lot of strong aromas and flavors going on. Maybe my palte is still too delicate, but something about it was a little offputting. Worth trying though.

Pours a hazy light yellow with a huge amount of froathy white head. Aroma is tart green apples, lemon, and hay. Flavor is definitely a lighter more citric beer with a very very very dry mouthfeel. Very much a mix of lemon and hay. Good beer.

Bracing nose of spicy noble hops, Saaz and Sterling? Green freshness is laced with sea foam and a small malt tries to peer out and loses. Astutely bitter entry, the hops dominate everything, in fact this could be called Belgian Hop juice as well as bitter any day. The beer finishes abruptly as a light pilsn malt fades and a sharp hop lingers with just the slightest touch of brett astringency. I would say this is a relatively fresh example and amazingly drinkable. Imagine a Duvel, with a little more old world character. 92

I wasn’t too impressed the first time I had this so I had to give it another try and this time I was more prepared for it. BBD Aug 2011??? Poured out a huge white cap that leaves excellent thick sticky lacing and has great retention. The beer looked lilke it might have a bit of haze in it but doesn’t. Lots of effervecence and appears straw / gold in colour - that was until I dumped all the sludge from the bottle into my glass - now it is more like weak metamucil. The aroma is odd - musty fruit, strong dusty wheat, yeast, floral, a bit of spice and at has the smell of orange juice gone bad (thanks Aracauna, that is dead on). That smell does fade in strength during the warming process. Taste is suprisingly mellow when you get past the large ammount of hops with notes of apricots (weak) and pepper . However, even with the heavy bitter flavour it still seems sort of flat or watery....interesting. The mouthfeel is also very good with lots of soft carbonation and a notable malty middle with the hop hammer at the end giving a very long finish. I’m not sure why I enjoyed this much more this time around but I will get more for the odd casual drink and cellaring. A 3.9 on my own personal rate scale is very debatable.