The Keeper's Veil Honey Saison
Burial Beer Co.

 

 

A: The beer is crystal clear yellow in color and has a light amount of visible carbonation. It poured with a finger high white head.
S: Light to moderate aromas of honey and floral essences are present in the nose.
T: The taste follows the smell and has floral flavors of chamomile, heather, and hibiscus along with notes of honey.
M: It feels light- to medium-bodied on the palate and has a moderate amount of carbonation.
O: This saison—particularly the taste—is very floral in nature. I liked the complexity of aromas and flavors of the different floral essences.

Serving type: can

 

Canned on 5/11/18

Pours an effervescent honey gold with a foamy two fingers of white head; really nice retention and some stringy bits of lacing.

Aroma strikes with big notes of sweet, herbal honey and some bits of barnyard funk tagging along; additionally, I’m getting some tree bark, hay, some more general funk, banana esters and yeastiness, and even a bit of nuttiness as well; I’m enjoying this tempered tango of earthy and sweet tones here.

Taste is light honey, hay, and malt on the finish, with some general herbaceous and earthy qualities playing a slight background role; unfortunately, these solid flavors are just too brief to make an impact, and never hang around too long before fading.

Mouthfeel is nicely carbed and crisp, with the stickier honey tones adding a unique edge to the finish fitting of a saison.

This is a solid drink that just unraveled a bit too much in its taste; unfortunate, because this clearly had potential and was shaping up to be something great. Nonetheless, it’s still very pleasant to drink, even if it fell a bit short of what it was working towards.

Before I taste this beer, I'll let it be known that while I love saisons (easily my favorite style), I am innately skeptical of honey beer, and generally don't care for it. That being said, let's begin:
A: Pours up a tangerine-esque amber color with a foamy, quickly receding white head.
S: Smells somewhat fishy right off, the yeast comes through like it is fresh out of the vial, with a very mealy note following that, a slight toastiness is present as well, with some herbal notes bringing up the rear.
T: Immediately yeasty, with some grainy notes and a watery quality, along with prominent floral wheat flavors, the honey is definitely present adding a supporting sweetness. The malt additionally, in its marriage with the honey, creates a slightly toasty flavor, and once again, this combined with the yeast creates a distinctly unpleasant fishy quality. Some tangerine definitely comes through as well.
M: it is crisp, but has a mouthfeel that for my money is heavier than it ought to be for a saison.
O: I'm gonna be honest, I hate this beer. It's not the worst thing I've ever had, and I don't think it's a bad beer per se, but it misses a couple of basic saison marks for me and at that point, for me, once you dump the honey on there the damage is done and it's beyond saving. The wheat and honey and yeast in combo just create a really unpleasant sensation for me. If you like honey beer, I feel like you will probably enjoy this, but I personally can not.

Look: It pours golden and fairly clear with a white head. The head has small beads and head retention is excellent.

Smell: It has a strong herbal aroma. There are flower notes with hibiscus and rose in the forefront. There is a moderate doughy-grainy smell with a low level of honey. There are also fruity notes as well.

Taste: The flavor is a bit more balanced with a combination of flowery, doughy, honey, and fruity esters. The flowery flavors of rose, hibiscus, and others are prominent early and the fruity esters become more prominent later. The doughy grain is balanced throughout the taste with the honey.

Feel: It has a surprising herbal, spicy twang in the finish as well as being a bit dry. It has a moderate body.

Overall, this is a well balanced, complex saison with multiple aroma and taste elements.

 

This is an insanely boring example of a saison. In terms of technical merits I can't really find anything necessarily off. However, the aroma is lacking and the flavors are extremely nuanced, but shouldn't be mistaken for delicately complex. This is a style I am very snobbish about and sadly this one underwhelmed. Quality brewer, lackluster offering.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Almost clear gold pour with huge white topper that threatened to crest and escape glass.

Full aroma that is yeasty tart meets doughy sweet and spicy fruit funk and together throw a party for the nose. Yummy scent.

Full strength taste, featuring more peppery spice than the bouquet predicts, but has all the flavors of aroma, plus some citrus flavors that are bitter and also kinda sweet. Finish is dry, but keeps some of the fruity tang to match the earthy spice nicely.

Med./high carb., highly viscous, med. bodied and soft on palate, with excellent clean lingering finish.

Just a refreshing treat of a saison that features full flavors and interesting mix that hits all the notes saisons are supposed to do. Recommended highly.

 

 

 

Pours a murky gold with medium to high carbonation. Aroma smells of bbq sauce? Maybe it's a smoky yeast phenol but fortunately it doesn't come through once you take a sip. Flavor is normal saison with some interesting yeast stuff going on. Maybe a slight sweet finish but feels crisp? Interesting saison, certainly drinkable.

 

 

 

Look - opaque golden yellow with a decent white head that disappears quickly.
Smell - honey and barnyard yeast notes are strongest, but there's also some grain and floral notes.
Taste - similar to the nose since the funky yeast is dominant along with semi-sweet honey, and the floral, malty characteristics hang out in the background.
Feel - high carbonation, medium body, dry finish.

 

 

This beer is the quintessential saison and dry. It has an herbal that is flowery and earthy and airy . It's so gentle and comes in a most imposing can with a very imposing theme except for the orange flowers. ( I wear glasses) It is also abundantly fruity . Green apple, cranberry and lemon on a honey drizzled wheat cracker. Generous although soft spoken with spice. The herbs do the bittering and leave behind a wonderful earthy mouthfeel that perfectly compliments the dry finish.

i am definitely surprised to not see this beer rated more highly. not only is it super unique, but its also super good. a honey saison brewed with a bunch of different flowers, its another brilliant beer from these guys, who are fast becoming one of my favorite operations anywhere. this recent round of beers to show up in colorado have all been incredible. this has a cool color to it, something darker than gold but lighter than orange, bronze maybe, with a short but very dense and persistent white head, creamy and rich looking. it smells like raw honey, the waxy polleny earthiness of it as well as the anticipated sweetness, its as authentic a honey smell as i have known in any beer, and its very forward. the flowers are neat, they obviously accentuate the polleny springy blooming aspect of the honey, add a neat bitterness and a tea-like property thats interesting but well behind the honey. the flavor is a lot like the nose, but i am amazed how much honey flavor is here for how dry it is. its also gorgeous with the malt, wheat, something toasted, kiln dried sort of tasting, a little rich, but very dry, just a long flavor experience between the two. the yeast is clean for a saison, no funk or tang or anything, just a brisk tartness for a moment, but really unoffensive, and slightly floral in its own right, orchard fruit and slight white wine, also nice with the authentic raw honey. the flowers add a lot, but arent too much like i feared they would be, this is an amazingly flavorful beer overall even despite not having such a dynamic yeast profile, i loved it. i have been so high on the burial beers lately, and this among the best of them. one of the best expressions of honey i have ever found in a beer, no kidding. do not miss this one while it is around here in denver!

Review from BA Mag Issue #116 ( Sep 2016 )

Herbaceous, Floral, Unique, Tasty
Not your usual Saison, but well within the style’s boundaries, The Keeper’s Veil is brewed with 6-row malt, wheat, local honey, and seven different wild herbs and flowers. The crispness is there along with just enough dryness; both honey and botanicals make for a very pleasing palate. A bit rustic from the combination of barley and wheat, but fresh and grainy with a nice bite in the end. Although the chamomile and lemongrass are more noticeable, as is a quick kiss of hibiscus, all of the herbs and flowers add up to a very pleasant mix for the tastebuds. [Jason]

Look 3.75 | Smell 4.00 | Taste 4.00 | Feel 4.00 | Overall 4.00

 

This was yet another beer that I traded for quite a while ago, as it had a date of 6/27 of last year on the bottom of the can. Though I've had a few of their collaborations with other brewers and samples of their other beers on the Other Half line, this was the first can I had here at home and boy, did it not disappoint. Most Saisons are quite spicy and filled with Belgian yeast but in this case, this was a beer unlike anything that I ever had before.

Loved the pour to this beer, as the hue was a wonderful sunset gold with traces of rose in there for some additional subtle radiance. Tons of hibiscus, elderflower, lavender, and honey in the nose as the spring floral notes and sweetness were all present in the taste as well. Bright, lively, and full of botanicals, this reminded me of Saint Germain and in a good way since that's my favorite cordial by a country mile! Wonderfully brisk and carbonated like champagne, there was enough spice here to make the feel like a tea or a post-dinner cordial without all of the accompanying alcohol to drown out the nuanced notes in this. The sweetness from the honey was the only lingering aftertaste as it left a slick and inviting coating on my palate, having me wanting yet another sip!

The alcohol was so light here that this *almost* felt like a session beer, from start to finish. Nothing that I've ever reviewed on here was quite like this and I doubt I'd ever come across a beer again that could take the best of spring and brew it for later consumption. This was an amazing concoction that deserved a higher rating on here, and has me wanting more from Burial. I'd love to have another can with me next April when the seasons change over!