Jolly Pumpkin Luciernaga (The Firefly)

Brewed by Jolly Pumpkin Artisan Ales
Style: Belgian Ale
Dexter, Michigan USA

Bottle. Hazy amber colour with small creamy white Mostly diminishing head. Fruity and yeasty aroma. Sweet spicy flavor.

Bottle. Amber coloured with a thin off white head. Aromas of balsamic vinegar, acetone, vanilla and yeast. Dry and fresh taste with notes of brett, orange fruit, hops and spice.

750ml bottle - $8.49 at Beverage SuperStore in Suwanee, Georgia. No listed batch number. Appearance: Pours out a clearish, dark orange body with a huge, dense, foamy, white head. Smell: Malts enveloped with acrid notes of musty wild yeasts, butyric acid, juiced apples, mangled pineapples, damp oak wood, earthy spices. Taste: Toasted, honeyish malts instantly disappear behind the strongly phenolic Brett character. Pristine pineapple juice blended with spoiled apple juice. The doses of Grains of Paradise and coriander are quite spicy and particularly pungent, giving the tongue a bit of enduring ginger-like heat. Touch of oak. Surprisingly bitter as well. Particularly dry finish with a lingering taste of the added spices. Mouthfeel: Medium-bodied. Medium-high carbonation. Drinkability: As always, it’s another weird, wild ride from Jolly Pumpkin. The spices can be a bit overly brash at times. While not the most captivating of the Jolly Pumpkin lineup, it’s certainly solid and worth a try.

Bottle shared thanks to 502flavors. Poured into snifter. Poured a medium honey color with some carbonation coming up from the bottom and seriously aggressive off-white head that laced pretty well too. The aroma is of unripe macintosh/machoon apples (half red/half green) and a mite vinegary. The taste is spicier, not as tart and very refreshing.

Bottle Batch 267/268. Pours a glowing clear but darker burnt orange with a tall brett inspired airy foamy white towering head that eventually fades into a very fine head with nice lacing. Aroma of brett, lovely oak, coriander, subtly sweet and sour. First taste is strong brett but that quickly is integrated with the fantastic oak and well rounded spices. A very round flavor, the oak, brett, maltines and spices really meld nicely while still being tantalizingly delicious, just fairly sour and sweet, touch creamy. Nice long brett and oak aftertaste with just a touch of tart sourness. Full mouthful, medium/light bodied, typical fizzy but soft brett dictated carbonation, uniform, dries the mouth out in the finish.

Clody golden with a tiny white head. Sweet and fruity aroma with discrete yeasty and citric notes. Flavour likewise. Finished sweet.

Greast musty smell with hints of spice, floral, just a lot going on here. Taste is Brett-like funk, hay, and the advertised herbs (very subdued and blended, I thought) and finishes nice and hoppy, a little tart. Impressive brew.

750ml bottle poured into a Trappist glass. I’ve wanted to try this beer for years. I bought quite a few JP beers all together and saved this one for last. To be honest, based on the other samples, I don’t like their product as a whole. Here goes with the final one... Luciernaga pours orange-colored with a large fluffy head that lingers nicely. The aroma has the vinegar cast that I’ve come to associate with the brewery. There’s also mild hops, coriander and faint bubble gum. Like nearly all of their other beers this one is quite tart but not offensively so. The tartness does drown out the flavors but the coriander shows through. I’m not impressed.