Cedar-wood Infused Quad
Brouwerij De Molen

 

 

 

 

 

10% ABV. Small bottle. Regrettably brief notes below:

A: ~1 cm khaki cap of ~5 minute retention. Body is a dark amber.

Sm: Cedar, sure - but I doubt I'd recognize it in a blind tasting. Cherry, prune, chewy fruits, caramelization. Fruity but not in the way the best quadrupel style beers are (with vivid expressive dark fruit).

Aromatic intensity is average.

T: Cedar is reticent. Flavour profile is shallow. Dark fruit profile is inadequate (no plum, no fig). Hop profile is minimal. Tends towards the sweeter end of the spectrum. Sherry wine comes to mind. Caramelization.

Mf: Gooey. Sticky. Full-bodied. A biteen thin, actually. Aptly carbonated. Not rough, oily, scratchy, astringent, harsh, gushed, hot, or boozy.

O: It's a reticent shallow quadrupel, and throwing in cedar chips won't make the base far better.

C+ / ABOVE AVERAGE

330ml bottle - I like it when brewers of any ilk are clearly open about how they've augmented their products. Here, the label plainly states that it's infused, and with cedar wood chips. Simple!

This beer pours a slightly glassy, dark rusty brick amber colour, with one finger of weakly puffy, loosely foamy, and bubbly beige head, which leaves a bit of combining bacterial culture lace around the glass as it quickly blows off.

It smells of bready and doughy caramel malt, richly blended and musty orchard fruit, free-range wet ash, indistinct grainy wood, subtle bittersweet chocolate, ethereal earthy and floral hop bitters, and a hovering sense of impending booziness. The taste is more dense bready, doughy, and grainy caramel malt, still muddled dark fleshy fruit (maybe some bruised red apple and plum), a touch of innocuous yeast, some very faint smoky woodiness, a twinge of that musty basement thing, and a clenched fist of potential alcohol astringency.

The carbonation is quite understated in its laid-back and beguiling frothiness, the body a solid medium-heavy weight, and more or less straight-up smooth - only that still obscured booziness perhaps seeping in a bit. It finishes sweet, but well moderated by fruit, malt, and yes, warmth alike.

Overall, a pretty well-made and enjoyable version of the style, the vast majority of the points hit upon. Now, to the guest ingredient - as this beer warms, I now get a hint of that character most familiar to me from my rarely-used cigar box. Other than that, its presence is ephemeral at best, almost to the point that I forgot about it for a length of time. Oh well - this is still an easy-drinking Quad.

 

Poured into tulip.
Pours clear cola beer with a ring of beige head, low retention.
Smell - wood, dark fruits, caramel, chocolate, rye bread.
Taste - sweet dark malts, roasted, vanilla, wood, chocolate, dried fruits, mild bitter finish.
Soft carbonation. medium body, not quad, to be serious, but still very good beer.

L - cola-coloured beer with a thin creamy head;
S - caramel, chocolate, raisins, cocoa;
T - almost the same as smell, sweet with a subtle bitterness;
F - pleasant chocolate-cocoa aftertaste with a mix of sweetness and bitterness;
O - quite enjoyable beer, unfortunately hard to get.

 

Enjoyed this beer on-draft at Proeflokaal Arendsnest Herengracht on 11/11/2015. Pours a mahogany hue with a nearly translucent clarity and a 1/2 inch toffee-colored head that dissipates towards the shoulders while dissipating into a soapy slick. Nose reveals raisins, figs, cocoa and ethanol, but surprisingly, no cedar notes. Taste was chocolatey with a light char and a mild hop character at the back. Mouthfeel was light-medium in body (but closer to light); however, it came off a bit thin for the style. Carbonation was pleasant and easy. Overall, a very enjoyable beer. There was some heat and the mouthfeel was a bit thin; however, it was quite drinkable and really doesn't need much aging in my opinion.

When I opened the beer more than I expected in every way. The only remarkable thing is the good treatment l'acohol, 10 degrees are completely sneaky, an excellent treatment. The rest is much improved. He lacks power, a point of gas, missing route, changing little in the glass and on the palate, it has a few nuances ..... much improved.