Le Vagabond
Powell Street Craft Brewery

Poured from a 650ml bomber

Appearance - a deep cloudy orange with a thick, dense head. Absolutely beautiful beer.

Smell - Very yeasty, with some sweet fruit in the mix to make it interesting.

Taste - A great balance of hop bitterness and citrus, with a touch of more fruit and bite to keep it interesting

Feel- Medium and creamy, with the right amount of carbonation.

Overall - a fantastic Saison that maintains its best qualities all the way through a full bomber. Very well done on the part of Powell Street Craft Brewery.

650ml bottle poured into Sam Adams pint glass.

Pours a slightly hazy light orange with three sturdy fingers of off-white head that leaves spidery arches of lace as it recedes.

Smells of stale white pepper, sliced apples and pears, bready pale malt, mild funk and faint citrus rind hoppiness.

Tastes of unsalted cracker malt, bruised orchard fruit, peppery yeast, mild citrus and indistinct hop bitterness.

Feels mild and creamy. Medium bodied with even carbonation. Finishes dry and yeasty.

Verdict: Recommended. Fairly yeast forward, but I can't really hold that against it.

 

Appearance - Pours a light amber with three fingers of foamy white head.

Smell - spicy yeast, citrus (orange, lemon), hint of wild strawberry, spicy hops, and pale malts.

Taste - Very malty upfront with the toasted malts taking the forefront. The spicy hops and hint of wild strawberry follow. The yeast and citrus (orange, lemon) are lost in translation as the malts overpower the brew.

Mouthfeel - Medium bodied with moderate to high carbonation. Finishes with a lingering sweetness from the malts.

Overall - A saison that started off on the right foot but wasn't executed to its full potential. The malts heavily dominated the brew and the yeast and fruit esters are non-existent.

This is a great looking beer - cloudy, orangey, with excellent head retention. The nose is full on yeast, with a bit of sweet clove mixed in for good measure. The taste is quite nice because it tends to the dry, peppery spectrum of the saison world. Overall, it's quite tasty - a beer I would definitely seek out again.

A prime example of why I avoid the lighter Belgian style beers from outside of Belgian. Banana-ey cough syrup-ey sweetness with a chalky finish. Some really nice malty, spiciness in the background, but the foreground is what made this undrinkable too me.

750ml bomber poured into tulip 21/2/16

A clear golden liquid with lots of bubbles everywhere, a thumbs width of soapy foam has great retention and leaves lots of random lace

S the nose is all yeast, spicy and peppery, some bubblegum maybe a little perfume, a little lemon rind, has a nice yeast profile but not a whole lot else

T a little sweet malt added to the mix, has a dry cereal thing working for it and maybe a little hay added to the nose, still lots of yeast but a little more going on

M medium bodied lots of bubbles but it stays on the creamy side of foam, very fine grit, spicy finish keeps going

O shes going down pretty fast so that says something, respectable saison for yeast lovers and I could see myself drinking this again

The yeast kinda owns this one but that's on par for the style, I'd like to see a hopped up version of this one but solid as is.

 

I had this beer on-tap in a tulip at the brewery.

Appearance: golden hue with just a dash of haze and a finger of frothy white foam. Nice.

Smell: very floral and slightly grainy with just a dash of farmhouse funk. I like it.

Taste: drier and a little more grainy than most saisons, it feels a little more like a bière de garde to me. A floral character makes it a little soapy -- but frankly I kind of like that.

Mouthfeel: medium body with a big carbonation and a good creaminess.

Overall: a good beer. Definitely worth trying.

650ml bottle - made with French saison yeast, which is apparently not a common thing to do.

This beer pours a clear, medium golden amber colour, with three fingers of puffy, loosely foamy, and bubbly off-white head, which leaves some interwoven tree branch lace around the glass as it evenly bleeds away.

It smells of gritty, grainy pale malt, muddled light orchard fruit, some faint earthy funk, cheesy yeast, ethereal mixed peppercorn spice, and a slight musty bitterness. The taste is grainy, crackery, and faintly bready pale malt, still hard to pin down fruity notes, musty florals, active yeast, subtle white and black pepper spice, a small underripe root vegetable thing, and more plain earthy, weedy, and wet hay-like hoppiness.

The carbonation is adequate in its supportive and occasionally clipped manner of frothiness, the body a solid middleweight, and so-so in its attempt at smoothness - that niggly musty/yeasty thing not doing anyone any favours. It finishes off-dry, the boring malt carrying on, the fruitiness dropping off, and that so-called French yeastiness putting it in neutral.

Overall, a fairly innocuous and not all that interesting version of the style, as the crispness that one typically gets from the better Belgian iterations is more or less lacking here. Not a bad brew, though, just not my particular cup of tea, which is, of course, another thing that the French aren't really known for.