t Smisje Honingbier

Brewed by Brouwerij De Regenboog
Style: Belgian Ale
Assebroek-Brugge, Belgium

Pours clear orange with a medium white head. Moderate honey aroma with some hops. Tad bit of grapes. Taste is a nice combo of honey, hops, and malt with some fruit mixed in. Clean tasting and quite nice.

Cloudy brown color, off-white head. Aroma of sharp sweet honey and yeast, some caramel malt. Taste is sweet honey and some yeast, bit caramel malt again. Weird beer, and nowhere near the quality of the dubbel and triple.

Aroma of honey, malts, some yeast and eucalyptus. Cloudy, brown coloured with an off-white, lasting head. Taste is initialy sweet, honey, malt and some spices in it. Some winey-sourness. Okay.

Bottle. Purchased at ’t Brugs Beertje. Lightly hazed brown with a small tan head. Nose is a musty honey aroma with honeycomb, spice, sweet malts, and a light hint of the alcohol. Taste is a carbonated brown sugar and honey mix with light spice and malt. Semisweet overall. The body is fully carbonated with spicy feel to it and it finishwith a mild brown sugar, light spice and more honey notes.

Plump honey and powerful spices in the aroma with a light vinous zing...That honey disappears though in the palate, buried under a cohesive heap of flower petals, orange zest and yeast...Sweet peachy malt in ample quantities makes for a hugely satisfying body and fruity acidity rushes up the palate but finishes sadly too fast...Herbal bitterness remains herald an interesting moment well-spent in yet another wild De Regenboog creation...

The aroma is very faint but sweet malty. The color is a clear brown and it has a fine lazing head, though disappearing. At first the flavor is a little sour, but then it turns into sweet honey combined with malt and roasted bread. An OK beer.

Copper-amber color. Mid-sweet aroma, with milk chocolate, light vanilla caramel and fudge. Some malt, sweet caramel; ends with a long medium caramel aftertaste. Quite ordinary.

Can't say I could particularly identify the honey, but there is an evident sweetness in both the aroma and the flavour. The sweetness is there on the palate but restrained and somehow syrupy at the same time. There's a sort of orange and cooking apple sharpness that builds up towards the finish, but a low hop profile. Put me in mind of those honey & lemon cold remedies. This is OK, but I have yet to find a honey beer that has really knocked my socks off. I think the honey adds a mouthfeel that I just don't find that appealing. Bottled, Brugse Beertje, September 2003.