Nimbus Belgian Golden Summer

Brewed by Nimbus Brewing Company
Style: Belgian Ale
Tucson, Arizona USA

On tap @ Nimbus - Pours a clear golden color with a thin off white head. Decent lacing, but Nimbus beers usually have a nice bit of lacing. Aroma is light esters and spice. Flavor is lighty toasted malt with a touch of sweetness, esters, and a slight bit of spice. Light to medium body. There’s not a lot of flavor, aroma, or body, but it’s easy to drink. I’m sure the non-beer dorks will enjoy it.

Sampled at Nimbus
The beer arrives from the tap a clear, full gold color that has just a touch of copper to it. The head is pretty thin, just a pale dusting of froth a top the beer. The aroma smells fruity up front with notes of pear and green apple. The finish has a spicy, earthy note that is a bit like coriander as well as a touch of herbal honey aromatics. Overall the aroma seems a bit weaker than I would expect, mainly meaning that the yeast / fermentation character doesn’t come into play nearly as much as I was expecting or hoping.

The beer is quite light bodied, a bit on the thin side even for a beer of this strength. There is a grainy flavor to this as well as some green apple notes (perhaps even acetylaldehyde which points to needing a bit more conditioning time). The finish is spicy with notes of pepper and a touch of coriander as well as a touch of ginger like notes. This is quite refreshing on this warm summer day; there is a prickly carbonation that works well with the light body. This is definitely on the light side in flavor as well; it could certainly use more fermentation character and / or even some nice hop notes would have been nice. There are some hop notes here, just enough to provide a light bitterness in the finish, though the carbonic bite is more distinct.

This is really not characterful enough for my tastes; it almost seems like a macro lager than has been lightly Belgian’ified; it is certainly not bad as there are no real flaws. It is just lacking a certain depth of flavor that I expect in better examples of light Belgian Blonds / pale ales.