Struise Pannepot Grand Reserva

Tasted 26/07/2008. 330ml bottle from Sune, shared with Sam and Steve in Invercargill. Murky brown, light lace. Sugary, caramel, fruity and a little sour, but it really lacks the finesse of a flemish ale. Maybe it’ll reach that point another 5 years.

Bottle. Pours a muddy brown colour with a big beige/light brown head. Aroma is dusty, sweet and slightly creamy in the vicinity of the glass. In the glass, it’s soft, sourish, and deep spicy. Fruit, horse blanket(?) and metallic notes. Plums as it warms. Flavour is sweet and alcoholic with fruity, metallic and spicy sourish notes. Finish is molasses with slight notes of banana and sharp, stingy alcohol notes. An okay beer, but I find a bit too metallic. 28-07-08.

aroma: dark fruits.. cheese???. nice overall, but the cheese got me off guard. pitch dark, small but very beautiful head. flavor dark fruits, lots of faint notes of different stuff, also cheese in there, no hint of the alcohol. Nice brew. gets even better as it warms up. With no competition whatsoever the very best aged beer i ever tasted. NO hints of aged beer in the taste. just interesting stuff.

Botella. Vintage 2005. Hazy deep dark brown colour with a small steady creamy beige head. Aroma of dark fruits, alcohol, good bitterness and toasty malt. The flavour is bitter-sweet with caramel, toasty malt, yeast, alcohol a pleasant tartness and spices.

Bottle opened at the Kelham Island Tavern, Sheffield, on RateBeer Valley of Beer Crawl ’08. Many thanks to cgarvieuk for sharing this wondrous substance. Dark brown with a small off white head. Sweet malty toffee and candi sugar aroma. Here are some comments on that 10 out of 10 rating from those around me: haddonsman said poetically, ’It’s fighting to get out of the glass, tripping over itself.’ Then he added, with some bathos, ’Very acceptable.’ Madame SilkTork perceptively came up with ’Shortbread’. The taste was sweet, sugary and smooth with an edge of sourness. Some bitterness to follow. ’Wonderful,’ I wrote in my notes. Then, in different handwriting, I see I have written, ’Wonderful’ again, which was puzzling.

(33 cl bottle shared with deft, purchased from Systembolaget special release)
On July 25, 2008
BB 12-12
Slight shady deep dark red to brown color, medium tan to light brown head. Sweet, spicy and lactic, but mainly alcohol, scent. Also smells butter (almost rancid) and fudge. Vinous, sweet and metallic taste. Lingering metallic aftertaste. A bit acidic. Smooth mouthfeel, low bitterness.
After finished rating I had some nuts with the beer as a snack and quickly realized this beer didn’t go well with it, brought out the metallic notes even more.

(Bottled) Very hazy, very dark ruby with a smallish and lacy, beige head. Sourish-malty aroma with some alcohol, and lots of oaky tannins. Lots of dried, dark fruit in the flavor, with some oakiness, and sweet, appleish calvados. No alcohol present in the flavor. Medium to full body with soft carbonation. Maybe an inch thin. I think the Reserva was the peak with this one. Now with the additional Calvados aging, the apple sweetness has taken over, masking most of the finesses. Still good, but no more than that. Nevertheless, I’m happy they did try...

Bottle: Poured a deep brown/burgundy color ale with a super large foamy head with some exceptional retention and great lacing. Aroma of apple is easily distinguishable with some oak notes and light candi sugar notes. Taste is also dominated by the calvados notes with some oak notes and a nice lightly sweet malt base. Great carbonation with a full body and no discernable alcohol notes. Very well done overall but I still think I prefer the original Pannepot and maybe the oak-aged/calvados-aged has replace some of the complexity of the original beer.