Defiant Resolution #1

BIG thanks to Neill for tapping this at his brewery for the trip back to Iceland. This is exactly what Brian told me it would be, insane whit beer. Belgian Grand Cru right here with a NY influence. I likes this very much, subtle sweetness. After the awesome tripel, this did not dissapoint! Neill, thanks again, it was a real pleasure meeting you and thanks again for tapping this for me!

Bottle from Lou18 as part of Mystery Swap 2.0. Turbid morning urine yellow color with 1-finger, fizzy, quickly dissipating head. Aroma of candi sugar, pale malt, apricot, honey, some funky spices, and some floral notes. Medium palate with tastes of citrus, coriander, lemon zest, candi sugar, pale malt. It smelled more like a saison/tripel mix, but tasted like a very spicy, floral witbier. More flavor complexity as more of the sediment arrived in the glass. A true hybrid stylewise, but a true original as an interesting, complex beer.

From the tap, Clear yellow/orange body with nice white head left good lacing. Fruit and yeast as always for a belgian, along with some spices and more fruit for the nose. Not sure what style you would put this in, but I RESOLVE to open my corked bottles and enjoy more of this. Excellent.

I have been drinking from a keg filled at the brewery in January. This beer has matured quite a bit over that period. Early on it was on the mark as a spicy witbier, but then it developed an unplesant tartness a month later. So much that it was just about not worth drinking. Now 2 months later, it has come totally around. The tartness has mellowed out and balanced with the wit/spice nature. For appearance, It is not the prettiest beer, being that it has a very yellow color, and a head that dissapated very fast, Tastewise it has the witbier character with some more agressive yeast/spice bite. The aroma is difficult for me to narrow down, it has some orange to it. Hops play the back burner in this beer, the yeast/malt relationship is driving its character. The yeast is alive so it is ever changing, Hopefully I will get to see this beer go somewhere else as it matures even more. It needs well over 15# of pressure pushing it, or else it will be totally lifeless.

750ml corked bottle from the brewery. Clear golden color with a good size white head that left nice lacing in my Duvel glass. Yeasty, fruity aroma with some spices(coriander, black pepper), honey and orange marmalade. Lightly sweet, yeasty flavor of coriander, oranges, pepper and biscuity malts with the alcohol very prevalent. Seems higher than 7.4% alc/vol. Interesting beer. Sort of a cross between a Belgian Wit and a BSA. The guy I bought them from referred to it as a strong golden ale. No matter how it is classified this is a very good beer from a very good brewer.