Saison Dupont Cuvée Dry Hopping 2017 (Styrian Eureka)
Brasserie Dupont sprl

 

Enjoyed 7-14-2020. Pours with beautiful head indicative of the style, Belgian yeast nose, smooth, malty sweet, dry finish. Hop notes almost unnoticed, as this beer is now 3 years old. But still very enjoyable at this age.

 

 

 

Looks beautiful. Pale golden body with an extremely frothy 2 finger egg-white head.

Smell: Dusty grass clippings. Lemongrass, old lemon peel. The inside of an Aspirin bottle.

Taste: Lemon. Bitter hops balance the slight tartness out. Not as funky tasting as the last regular Dupont I had--maybe that is because this one is fresher. Earthy yet fresh tasting noble hops to me.

Feel: Doesn't seem as crisp or evervescent as a regular DuPont. Medium bodied.

Overall: Interesting offering from Dupont. This beer seems suited to be paired with food vs. being enjoyed on its own.

Poured from a recently purchased bottle into the large tulip glass
A - Beautiful goldenrod color, aggressive carbonation piles into a pillowy froth .
S - A bit of dust, hay, white pepper, some autumn flowers
T - Very similar to Dupont , the dry hopping adds an earthy element that is quite welcome
M - Prickly carbonation, light in body, with an amazing herbal llinger
O - A very nice enhancement on a classic, worth trying

 

 

750 ml bottle, purchased about a week ago. Shouldn't be more than 6 months old or so.

Pours thick, hazy, and honey-colored with a soapy white head. Very pretty.

Smells yeasty and warm. It's nice, but pretty straightforward for a saison.

Tastes like it smells: a bit less funky and earthy than Dupont's regularly offering, the hops are certainly more up front, but overall it's not all the different from the flagship. Starts warm and spicy, gets dryer and yeastier in the middle, finish with wheatmalt pepper and hoppy spice.

Hazy golden range with a huge head of rocky foam. Classic Dupont Saison aromas: flowery noble hops, melon, pear, soft spicy yeast, mellow bubblegum, and white bread. Grassy/peppery hops, fruity yeast esters, orange, straw, and a light doughy sweetness. Medium bodied, effervescent, frothy, and dry. Good - might've been better a few months ago.

A: Pours with a luxurious and creamy, three finger head, with strong retention, & good lacing; with a hazy straw gold body.
S: Comes across as herbal and warm, with some wheaty, grainy notes; and strong elements of spice.
T: Immediate citrus and warm biscuit notes come across right away with strong spicy notes and an earthy minerality.
M: Full bodied and dry.
O: This beer is excellent, it is everything you could want in a saison, granted it's not perfect, but it's pretty damn close, to me better than the original, it goes without saying you should try this.

 

 

A minor point, this is not the correct photo. The actual bottle has "Styrian Eureka" reversed out with a gold background beneath "Dry Hopping." (Hopefully, the next reviewer is more adept than I and can load the proper photo.)

Given the level of hops, I thought I'd push the Belgian pairing range and Have this with Indian food. Truly dry, it went well with milder curries and chutneys and breads; almost sort of moderating the taste buds to appreciate the subtleties of the foods. (The experiment went less well with spicy dishes.... for which I think I'll continue pairing with IPAs and hoppy lagers.)

The 2017 rendition clearly Looks (rocky head) and Smells (yeasty, malty, fruity) like a Dupont. In the Tastes, more pronounced are several different fruits: apple, citrus rind, probably peachy too. Feel is bubbly and dry and maybe the hops linger too long for a malt-head like me.
Overall, a very good offering from a favored Belgian brewer. I'll try it next year with spicy food if it uses a juicier hop.

 

 

 

Brasserie Dupont "Saison Dupont Cuvée Dry Hopping (Styrian Eureka)"
750 ml brown glass bottle, corked and caged
$10.99 @ Roger Wilco, Pennsauken, NJ

Notes via stream of consciousness: Beautiful label as always. The cork opened easily; and it poured a very hazy golden body beneath a two-finger thick head of frothy white that settled quickly into a finger-plus-thick head of rocky, meringue-like foam. The aroma is typical saison yeast over a sugary malt base. It's spicy, gently fruity (marmalade, apple, green banana), sweetish with vanilla, and dry with a light grassiness and some earthiness. The flavor follows suit, and thankfully it's not too spicy. The vanilla is clear and the fruitiness is similar but fuller: there's some additional light peach, mango, papaya, and soft pine. Perhaps some dark berries as well. A stiff bitterness balances it, and along with the spiciness from the yeast, some pine, and a spritz of alcohol it finishes dry with some earthiness and minerals lingering.

Pale colored body was cloudy, and very effervescent. The head was large upon pouring, at four fingers thick, and amazingly kept growing as the beer sat initially instead of dying down. The aroma was quite mild and pleasing, giving off smells of pear, banana, and clove. The taste was quite a bit like a Hefeweizen, with notes of banana, clove, and bubblegum. There was also a mild pepper spice in the taste, and just a touch of brett funk. Despite the dry hopping approach, and specific hop variety listed on the label, the hop flavor was quite subdued, and perfectly in line with a typical Saison. The Feel was very smooth and silky, and the beer was very easy to drink. A quality beer, but not all that different than regular Saison Dupont.

 

Pours a nice fizzy bubbly 1 finger head that fades at a fair pace, a little lacing, murky carrot orange color.

nose big Belgiany aromas, Belgian golden malt and creamy wheat perhaps, a little candy malt and Belgian candi sugar, plenty of fruity esters, white raisin, a little apricot like, faint banana and pear, some phenol spices as well, a little grassy floral hop but very little, also flaked wheat and biscuity notes.

Taste starts with sweet malt, big Belgian golden malt again, toasty and a bit biscuity, more flaked wheat and a little creamy, with plenty more Belgian yeast characters, a little yeasty too, but plenty of fruity esters, again white raisin, pear, dried apricot, with more phenol spices again, a hint of booze coming with the phenols, with some earthy spicy grassy hops kicking in, fair bitterness overall, with big earthy spicy hop on the back end finishing with a long bitterness, little citrus late as well, and more golden sweet candy malts.

Mouth is med bod, loads of fluffy carbonation perhaps too much even, little creaminess.

Overall a nice Belgian beer, the base is great as expected, the hops are not quite matching well with the rest of the beer but it adds an interesting twist.

Picked this up for $12.99. I have not had a bottle of Dupont in quite some time so it was difficult to compare this version to the standard. This was goo though. Spicy aroma, my wife thought it was LaChouffe at first. Very yeasty and estery aromas and flavors. Good saison as to be expected.

 

 

Pours the usual slightly hazed golden color with a thick cap of dense foam. Rings of chunky lace partway down the glass. Smell: earthy, floral, eucalyptus-y and black pepper, peach and honey bread beneath. Taste: spicy and a bit citric, pear in syrup, white peach, sweet graininess, allspice (!), finishing with a little more white peach and quickly drying out. The usual high carb yet pillowy feel. Interesting hop in this context. It's also a great opportunity to try fairly young Dupont saison. at only about 2 months in the bottle.

 

Poured into a Gulden Draak tulip. Pours a hazy golden amber with a fine two finger white head with great retention and thick lacing. Aroma of mildly grainy biscuit malt, saison and bready yeast, clove, pear and hints of light stone fruit; mild grassy hops. Flavor is grain-forward malt with a little huskiness, saison yeast, coriander and clove, pear and apple. Finishes dry with residual clove and light grassy hops, lingering clove and grain. Medium bodied with light creaminess and sharp, peppery carbonation. A fine, lightly hopped rustic saison. The body is classic Dupont saison with good grain flavors with some husk notes, but not coarsly bitter. The flavor is complex and reveals different fruit and spice elements during the taste, leaving pleasant lingering hops and spices with the light grain malt. The body and carbonation are great. The hops are not all that distinct, and I'm not sure that I can differentiate the herbal hop flavors from these varieties as the spicing is more dominant, but the hops really add a nice element to the flavor. Very nice saison. Looks, smells and tastes great.