Originally Posted by
sheffield hatter
I hope no one was taking bets on whether I would go for the fourth Belgian abbey beer. Here's a tip: drinking a fourth beer is a lot easier than stopping drinking and cooking dinner.
I think Grimbergen is probably the least respected of the breweries that describe themselves as Abbey. A bit like Marstons compared with Harveys, in terms of English family/regional breweries. I don't know what the comparative volumes are, but certainly Grimbergen blonde is seen in every supermarket in France. When I'm there, I always pick up one or two (per supermarket, not per holiday, you understand) because they always go down well; never come across Optimo Bruno 10% before though.
The label is very strong on the authenticity of the abbey brewery - "een authentiek abdijbier met een uitgesproken karakter" or "au caractère prononcé" - I love "uitgesproken". It's looks or sounds like the beer is outspoken, but it just means pronounced, like the French prononcé does. (UI in Dutch or Flemish is OW in English: like Zuider Zee= South Sea. The UI=OW sound is usually mispronounced by the BBC and hence by everyone else, so in the UK we call the greatest ever footballers Johan Croiff and Kevin de Broiner instead of Johan Crowff and Kevin de Browner.)
This beer pours with a thick, creamy head which is slow to clear, but I don't get much in the way of aroma apart from a little beery yeastiness. The mouthfeel is not as silky as tonight's first beer, the Bock, but it's certainly not gassy. (This is probably why I prefer dark bottled beers, for the most part: either the malt "hides" the gas, or the beer is naturally less gassy...who knows.) The flavour is fairly subtle. Alternatively, my taste buds are shot after tonight's alcoholic blast. I'm reminded a little of Pelforth Brune, which is another that I go for in France, though that is "only" 6.5% and a lot sweeter than this too. I expect a 10% dark beer to have more complexity than this, so I must admit to being a little disappointed. There's another one in the cupboard-under-the-stairs, so maybe I'll give that a go when it's first on the menu, rather than last.
Wouldn't mind something with a bitter finish to cleanse my palate. Now, what have I got in that cupboard-under-the-stairs...