Favorite Grisette

I don't even know what a Grezzaca is!

 

Don't know many that are widely available, but here's an excellent article on traditional grisette.

http://www.horscategoriebrewing.com/2015/10/what-is-grisette.html

 

clara is excellent as someone else said, I would say for me though, La Griseta is my favorite from Oxbow, but they are both excellent.

 

My preferred beer that is labeled as being a Grisette is Sly Fox Grisette Summer Ale.

Cheers!

 

Though not a reflection of you liking this beer, at 5.6% ABV, I'd be very hard pressed to call this a grisette. This is one of those for-instances that I abhor where marketing takes precedence over nomenclature.

 

I attended Dave Janssen’s presentation at HomebrewCon 2016 on the topic of Historic Grisettes/Saisons.

On chart 10 he appropriately stated: “Modern Belgian grisettes ≠ historic grisettes”.

Even more appropriately he could have simply not have listed the adjective of “Belgian” in the above statement.

Further considering that no style guideline (that I know of) explicitly defines what constitutes a beer style of Grisette it seems that in 2017 there is a fair bit of latitude here.

Cheers!

 

He's a good dude. Love his blog. It's THE place to get great historical information on subjects like this that have the latitude that you mention.

 

So I guess a Grisette is a low ABV Wheat Ale.

 

I agree that there is lots of good information there but in speaking with Dave Jannsen he would be the first to instruct you that there is a lot of contradictory information published on the history of Grisette and Saison. While he is willing to take a crack at 'defining' what a Grisette or Saison might have been in the 1800's he would never advertise what he is doing is definitive here.

The latitude that I am referencing is how contemporary Grisette beers are (or can be). Just like an IPA brewed in 2017 is different from an IPA brewed in 1900 or 1800. It would be unrealistic to expect contemporary beers to be the same as those old beers. I still consider Firestone Walker Union Jack to be an IPA even though it is notably different from a Hodgson's Pale Ale of circa 1800 or a C.H. Evans IPA of circa 1900.

Cheers!

 

Do you consider beers that are predominantly brewed with barley malt and minority wheat malt (e.g., 15%) to be a Wheat Ale?

Cheers!

 

I apologize if I inferred that he was the definitive source for anything. Simply wanted to state that he was doing an outstanding job at researching beers like grisette.

I certainly agree here, but when one is trying to resurrect an extinct or almost extinct style of beer, one should have some type of historical reference or at least a basis for said resurrection, don't you think?

 

I'm in agreement that Clara and La Griseta are two of my favorites. Two others that I found enjoyable are Idle Hands' Child of the Sun and Les Grisettes from Green Bench Brewing.

 

I think it's the only grisette I've had, but Transit of Venus with lemon and strawberry was magical.

 

Bloody Butcher from Fonta Flora was fantastic to me....

 

I guess so

 

A lot of styles like IPAs, most Belgian styles, some stouts, and even some lagers have a small portion of wheat in the malt bill. I think I read somewhere that wheat has to be at least 30% of the grain bill to be considered a "wheat ale".

 

Funny I just replied in another thread to someone who says he cannot get a diversity of styles made locally, only IPA and stout, and I told him it was just the opposite here. Yard Owl, one of our locals, makes two delicious grisettes.

 

When it comes to the topic of Belgian Ales and ‘styles’ this can be very confusing on a holistic basis. Belgian brewers for centuries have preferred to be creative in their brewing and being ‘pigeon holed’ to a style guideline is of little to no interest to them.

Let’s discuss Grisette beers of circa 1880. It would not surprise me at all if there were two beers with Grisette on their labels that were distinctly different.

On chart 12 of Dave’s presentation which is entitled “Types of Grisettes” he details three different types:

· Young/Ordinary

· ‘De Saisons’

· Superieure/Double (i.e., a stronger beer)

On Chart 13 he provides a table with Grisette label details

· Category 1: 0

· Category 2: 1

· Category 3: 2

· Household: 2

· Table: 4

One of the questions that could be posed is: what do the various Category numbers mean? The only genuine answer is that delineate varying strengths (original gravities) but at the time of the presentation he did not exactly know the values (he could speculate). But needless to say there is quite a bit of variation from an OG perspective from these various Grisette labels.

It seems to me that as regards the topic of Belgian Ales there is plenty of variation and when it comes to the specifics of historic Grisette beers this variation exists as well.

Cheers!

 

If you ever determine the source of that information I would be interested in reading it.

Cheers!