Tripel
Ninkasi Brewing Company

 

 

 

Poured from 22oz bomber into my Val-Dieu goblet.

Appearance: medium golden hue with a moderate haze and effervescence. Head is a thin layer of white foam that doesn't stick around super long; still, a nice-enough looking tripel.

Smell: very malty and sweet with a little dose of orchardy fruit aroma. No overtly alcoholic heat, which is good; not bad at all.

Taste: malty and sweet as the style should be, though it does have a fair bit of alcoholic heat in the flavor and not a ton of distinguishing character. That said, it's a decently-made tripel.

Mouthfeel: medium body with a moderate carbonation and a pretty good creaminess for the style.

Overall: not a bad beer, if not one that really stands out. Pretty well-crafted for an American execution of the style.

 

 

22oz bottle - windmills and mountainscape vistas on the label, how very, um, Belgian?

This beer pours a clear, bright medium golden yellow colour, with two fingers of puffy, loosely foamy, and fizzy off-white head, which leaves just a bit of surface berm lace around the glass as it quickly blows off.

It smells of gritty and grainy pale malt, a lesser biscuity caramel sweetness, lightly estery yeast, some earthy clove and otherwise muddled pepper dust spiciness, and very tame leafy and perfumed floral green hop bitters. The taste is bready and doughy pale malt, thin caramel notes, some still mixed tropical and domestic light fruitiness, a chewed-out bubblegum-heavy yeast profile, fading earthy spice notes, and more heady weedy, leafy, and boozed-up floral verdant hoppiness.

The carbonation is pretty meek in its hard to love frothiness, the body a solid middleweight, and actually more or less smooth, as the big booze quotient seems rather benevolent, as such. It finishes off-dry, but weirdly trending toward the latter, as the spice and alcohol jam 'er into the next gear.

Overall - once again, I find fault in the parsing of this style, yet when I just sit back and lazily quaff it, ain't nothin' wrong at all. Which is probably what the original producers of this high-test offering intended - don't think too hard about it, nor the bullshit parts of your life that led you to drink it in the first place. Or something like that.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lots of grass and o touch of funk in the nose. Tastes sweeter than expected. Pretty decent triple.

On tap at Albertsons. Pours out a bit dull, head dissipates quickly. Normal triple aroma, sweet grain, herbs, coriander, body OK, kind of slick. Taste also in the right range, buttery, floral, grassy. Near there, but needs work.

 

On tap at Verdugo Bar in Los Angeles, CA.

Pours a hazy light gold with a foamy off-white head that settles to a partial film on top of the beer. A foamy lattice of lace coats the glass on the drink down. Smell is of grain, yeast, spice, and fruit aromas. Taste is much the same with grain, spice, and yeast flavors on the finish. There is a mild amount of yeast bitterness on the palate with each sip. This beer has a good level of carbonation with a crisp mouthfeel. Overall, this is a good beer that is tasty, but the fruit aspect I am getting only comes through in the smell.

Serving type: on tap.

 

an okay beer, good even, part of the r and d series they do, and newly on tap in denver. its really light as they go, light in grain complexion, which unfortunately is what makes this style distinct for me, the three part grain blend, but i dont get that here, if there are oats, there arent many of them, and the wheat is really light, the beer almost looks filtered in the glass, not unattractive, just less true to style. the nose and taste are the same, rather one dimensional, but not off at all, and almost entirely dominated by the belgian yeast strain, which isnt particularly offensive or anything on the esters, but has little else going on to compliment it. its better to me as a belgian blonde than as a tripel, but i like the light bubblegum aromas, and the orchard fruit finish. some residual sugar, but its also well hoppy as the style goes. good not great again from ninkasi. i must have had all their awesome beers first, because most of what i have lately has been relatively unimpressive.