Silenrieux Joseph Spelt Ale

Brewed by Silenrieux
Style: Specialty Grain
Silenrieux, Belgium

The Lure:
Blades of hay stick to the cork dryness. Citrusy fruitiness stepping into the cereal crispness. Yeast is felt, but that soft funkiness brought on by the cork-y farmhouse character is what sticks to the nostrils.

The Festivities:
A fluffy mouthfeel is created by the agreeable straw-like malts and the peaceful carbonation. Bière de garde-ish yeast and cereals add minty freshness and bubblegummy sweetness to the summer farmhouse. Some quirky soap passes by, but gets discouraged at the authentic state of the household. No one complains.

Transcendence:
Let’s check out the chicken coop.

Bottle. Here’s to freaking JoeT!! I will toast to our webmaster every time I drink a beer with the word "Joseph" in the name. This might be the last one ever, but...dammit, I just ruined my own moment. Bright yellow, hazy pour with a sickly looking head that goes away in less than a minute. I found the aroma to be a very well-balanced combination of sourness, clove, spice, and yeast, but it sort of falls apart beyond that. ’Dusty" , to borrow from the rating below mine, is a very good description of the body and mouthfeel (thanks Presario). The taste is just too sharp for the rest of it and it’s just not as satisfying as it could be oveall.

VERY carbonated. Pale yellow. Clear to cloudy depending on bottle movement. Thin yeast aroma. Dusty body. Thin. Not a lot of flavours.

Cloudy pale yellow color, big frothy white head. Loads of yeast. Aroma of some hop, yeast, wheat, citrus. Not the obvious banana, which is usual in belgian whites. Bit more spicy taste, slightly bitter palate. More a white beer from the southern part of belgium, which are a bit more spicy. Nothing special, there are way better belgian whites.

Yellow-wheaty in appearnace and aroma. The belgian qualities are noticeable in the head. Mostly this a very simple, nice, unassuming beer; however, I don’t think that I’d like to pay the price for it again. For being wheaty its pretty darn good (maybe spelt makes a difference).

(Bottle 75 cl) 5,5% ABV in my version. Silenrieux really loves the odd grain. I’ve had their buckwheat beer before, now the time is for their spelt beer. Pale, cloudy golden with a small, white head. Really a witbier look. Some spicy, citrusy notes with a dry, tart finish. No bitterness to speak of. Fresh indeed. 160598

From a 750ml bottle Pours a cloudy yellow grainy color with a small head. Smells great. Apples, coriander, banana. On second thought, it smells like baby food! Weird... Taste is really sweet. Apple flavors and yeasty. Almost vanilla pudding flavor. Light bodied and thin. Smooth. Too sweet for me but not bad. Interesting beer but not one I’ll sample again. Can’t think of one good situation this beer would fit.

Unfortunately, this was a corked bottle (i.e. it tasted like cork.) No head. Cloudy, yellow color. Odd flavor. A little bit sweet. Hints of citrics.