Rochefort Trappistes 8

Bottle. For some reason I get banana bread, and fermented grape alcohol, highly malty profile in the aroma. Pretty decent pour as expected with this caliber of trappist ale, large foamy off-white head with some brownish particulate from the bottom of the bottle, murky and mahogany in color, satisfying lacing. Taste is complex, it doesn’t really register till it hits the back of the tongue, in the middle there is instant of leafy bitter hop, then sweet raisons, wine alcohol (which I’m usually not a fan of but tonight it kind of worked, too prevalent than it had to be though), and minor licorice, a puckering sweet dark berry, finish with toffee malt, aftertaste linger is perhaps the best part the experience, rather full bodied and strong. To say I didn’t enjoy it is a lie, but I was slightly disappointed, the complexities just didn’t go together quite as i would like, still a very worthy beer though.

Ugh. Why do I find it so hard to get my hands on an un-oxidized Trappistes Rochefort... It’s painful too cuz I can just tell from the flavor profile that it’s good when untainted :(. We’ll give this one another try at some point I guess.

Very nice beer, tastes almost the same as the 10 but less intense. Everything is toned down a bit, for the price I would just buy the 10 any day. Less fruit n the nose, less sweet taste, even the head seems a bit lighter.

Very nice, as are all the beers from Brasserie Rochefort. Yeasty flavor, bready. Pours a nice brown color. I can’t put it up there with the Trappiste Rochefort 10, but it’s a damn good beer.

[Archive, the sad part of it, seemingly] Toffee aroma, not much head. Brown.

Pours a murky brown color with nice size head. Aroma is similar to the 10 only slightly lighter. Taste is very good much like the 10 but more fruit flavor and not the chocolate notes like the 10. I prefer the 10 but this one is close.

Bottle. So I didn’t put a lot of effort into rating this one, but after 1500+ other ratings, it’s probably alright. Already rated the 10 and the 6, and, well, this one smells like a Rochefort, same earthy yeastiness, yeasty breadiness, same rich fruitiness, just in between the other two. Lots of figs, apples, raisins, pears, prunes, etc., some nuttiness, lots of toffee, it’s a Rochefort, nothing I’m going to say is going to change anything. I will say that I don’t understand why some folks prefer this to the 10 because to me the 10 is magic, and this is just a breath away in pretty much every regard (hence my numerical rating of 1 point less in each category than the 10). ...Rerate I’ve basically decided it smells and looks as good as the 10 but falls short once it gets in the mouth in terms of filling the mouth with all goodness the 10 does.... It’s awesome, enough said.

Sampled from bottle: pours a murky brown colour with a medium sized beige head. Aroma is pleasent, raisins, fig newtons, black cherries and soft chocolate malt. Mouthfeel is creamy, rich, with soft noticeable alcohol taste running along the palate. Flavors are semi sweet, caramel malt, dark fruit and soft spice.