Struise Pannepot Grand Reserva

Drunk to celebrate my rating number 10100 - the presently highest rated beer available to me, that I haven’t yet rated. A deep red beer with a medium dark brown head. The aroma is sweet with strong notes of herbs, spices, brown sugar, caramel, and malt. The flavor is sweet with strong notes of malt, spices, herbs, and caramel and medium notes of plums and wood, leading to a dry herbal finish.

Bottled at Monk’s Café, Stockholm. Dark hazy mahogany colour, small beige head. Aroma of pear brandy and calvados. Fairly sweet with a wealth of caramel. The dense malty body almost disappear in the immense spritzy liveliness. Lots of wood, caramel and prickly pear. Very elegant. Ultra-complex and near perfect. Perhaps the calvados detracts a little more than it adds.

(Bottle 33 cl) Pours a clear, dark, orangey brown with a small, creamy, beige head. Complex aroma of wood and vanilla. Full-bodied with strong notes of iron on the fore, then some sweet caramel and later an unusual lightly smoky edge. Also has an odd underlying salinity. Some alcohol in the finish. Quite an interesting beer - sort of a Belgian Old Ale. But far from my personal Top 50. 040308

Light brown. Mapley, with a hint of wood and vague florals (some of Pannepot’s goodness is obfuscated). Hot body, with splashes of fruit, and lush malts. Again, the barrel is getting in the way of my Pannepot. There’s a quality beer buried underneath of this hot imbalance.

Bottle. Dark brown coloured with a lacing off white head. Vinous and sweet aroma dominated by dried fruits and tobacco with notes of vanilla, fruits, pepper and yeast. Flavour of dried fruits, liquorice, tobacco, pepper, yeast and vanilla with notes of wood and alcohol. Peppery and warming alcoholic finish. Fizzy palate.