Gribousine D'Hiver
Brasserie La Binchoise (Malterie des Remparts)

Coming in a 330ml short brown bottle, bottled on 10/10/2008; served lightly chilled in Kasteel's broad-rimmed chalice.

A: pours an elegant dark reddish amber hue with very fine carbonation and a thin but frothy off-white head to last; the yeast sediments are almost all left in the bottle, hence a decent clarity overall.
S: fig jam, flowery honey, aromatic guava, melted rock sugar and boiled sweet soy beans accompany the amber malts, underlined by a fine hint of spiciness in the background. The maltiness is sweet, intense, but still very pleasant, balanced by a lesser profile of hops, yeast esters and a hard-to-describe edge of fruit sourness (a bit like sweet lemon plus hawthorn fruits but not exactly so).
T: the marvellously carbonated swallow of pungently spicy (from hops I think), semi sour-sweet malts & honey-ish fruitiness precedes a quietly intensifying flow of mineral-ish palate of hops & yeastiness, leading towards a chewy, semi-dry and pleasantly spicy-bitter finish where a hint of boiled yam also lingers. The flavour profile is reminiscent of a nice hoppy Belgian Amber Ale and not so much like a heavily spiced wintry/X'mas ale - all for the better, I should think!
M&D: the palate benefits from the super fine and healthy carbonation, the body remains moderate throughout, and only in the long finish does the alc. make a much belated and mild presence. I find this ale an averagely delicious fair, but the depth and structure felt on the palate give it a bit more credit than otherwise. Very drinkable indeed!

Red color, with a lot of floating corpuscules. Decent head, almost white, quite compact.
The smell is on the floreal notes, with tea, lemon, camomile, spices. The some fruitiness, something like peach. But after all, it is really light, and not very interesting. Though, the alcohol (8.5 ABV) is not perceptible.
The same for the taste.
Nothing remarkable.
Drinkable, no more.

BB 8-2006.Nice and lasting head and a amberbrown beer. Quiet clear and apealing. Nose is also giving lots of honey/dark candy and good rhubarb, birchjuice, koreander and pine. Taste is also very intresting and overal very spicy; sweet gale, peppered, alcoholic, hoppy and koreander bitter, dark candy and overal very full and interesting taste. Yes this is a fine winterwarmer and also well drinkable on a summernight. Good carbonisation and full tasty mouthfeel. Well drinkable but maybe cause of ernormous taste not draining down that easy.