Gassa D’Amante
Birrificio Del Forte

750ml, stylish as ever bottle. Another molto grazie is in order to the dear doktorzee, for lugging this back for me from his recent trip to enjoy la dolce vita. More maritime imagery, this time an ode, I think, to the steadfastness of a ship's bowline in the Italian navy. Or something.

This beer pours a hazy, somewhat cloudy pale golden yellow hue, with three fingers of fine, puffy, thinly foamy stark-white head, which leaves some thick, patchy, swirling storm front lace around the glass as it evenly subsides.

It smells of softly bready, somewhat pastry-like pale malt, a mild doughy yeastiness, a hint of unripe apple, and floral, earthy hops. The taste is gritty biscuity, white bready malt, a subtle hint of drupe fruitiness, ethereal black pepper, a sort of acrid yeastiness, and earthy, leafy hops.

The carbonation is fairly frothy and a bit fizzy at times, the body medium-light in weight, and tacitly smooth, as those bubbles have a certain sort of staying power. It finishes barely off-dry, the biscuit character of the malt kind of throwing it under the bus, while the middling noble hops kick back and think the most civilized of thoughts, i.e. 'where we gonna eat?'. Anyways.

A decent pale ale of the Belgian bent, with a sharp hook into English bitters territory. Maybe a bit too fizzy, but well-balanced enough overall, and a pleasant illumination of what craft brewers are doing in a nation so (justifiably) tethered to il vino.