Conundrum saisonale

Hello,
 

           in the run up to Christmas I was asking Davefromtshop what delights he had for me to buy. Knowing I was a fan of the style he told me about the Fantome Saison. Apparently it was considered a classic, and had orgasmic and worshipful rave reviews on Ratebeer, which comes as a surprise what with reviewers on there being so shy of scaturient outpourings....
 

Then came the caveats. I listened carefully. Reviewers had almost unanimously noted it smelled really unpleasant (but tasted nothing like its aroma). Also, it was strong, and heart-stoppingly expensive.

Despite these warnings, I decided to buy a bottle, since I got the feeling it was a bit of a coup for The Archer Road Beer Stop (where I used to work, and whose owner I am a good friend of, just to provide full disclosure!) to stock it. I bought two of this enormous bottle of 8.0% beer, and tonight I'm tasting one.

The first surprise comes from the fact that on opening the cap there's a cork underneath. What is this, radioactive material! How likely is it that the contents will escape? Once I got the cork out, with a satisfying pop, I got to encounter the aroma, or, erm, smell, for myself. Hmmm. Its not foul but its a bit vegetably and tart and reminds me in some ways of compost, or more worryingly, off beer. Luckily the taste is unrelated to the above description. However, the taste is my next screwed up face making puzzle....
 

I should point out that I'm drinking this as I write. Its almost less hassle than making notes and then typing them up, and also stops me from constantly taking photos. My gut reaction is that I think the taste is the beers most surprising element - and I'm not sure if I think that's a good thing.
 

One thing's for certain - this is a strong beer and it needs to be chilled. Carbonation and sharp flavours and that lovely Belgian yeast don't need to be served at room temperature. As I have a lovely Orval glass, at least half the bottle is back in the fridge. I suspect that may restrain the flavours slightly so they meld seamlessly together. At the moment I am drinking three beers in one. Its a very confusing experience for my palate.

 

The first hit is yeast. Its that recognisable sweetish Belgian affair that really should be in a saison. Then there is orange, and bitterness, almost like a Fullers Vintage Ale. Its not terribly easy to drink either, but its 8% and not cold. I don't think its trying to ape the refreshingly light farmhouse style that I seem to lean towards, but equally I'm not sure what its trying to be.
 

The other element in here is a sweet and sour battle between barley sugar and astringent almost bitter fruit flavours. In one mouthful it goes Corsendonk Pater (note have not had this in years, this is an unreliable taste memory), gueze, Buxton Rye and an aftertaste of orange boiled sweets and the Popperings Hommelbier. To be honest, it could be described as fruit salad sweets, Kriek, Magic Rock High Wire, Marmite and Gulden Draak. That's far less accurate and a bit silly, but it performs the task of bamboozling your expectations and (on drinking), your taste-buds in a similar way. Why won't you make sense unusual saison thing!
 

I've took the glass out of the freezer now and poured slightly more chilled beer into it, and noted that the list of ingredients includes spices. Not which ones of course, that wouldn't be sufficiently "artisanal", but maybe there could be a clue in there? Other than that, the temperature exercise has achieved nothing. Where Urthel Saisonnaire and Saison Dupont have a refreshing lemony edge, this has a slightly jarring sour bitterness, more like earthy lime than zesty lemon. Its easier to drink now its cold but I'm not getting that must have, super refreshing palate cleansing mouthfeel that my favourite saisons have had.

Despite that, an hour after pouring I'm sort of warming to the ascorbic aftertaste, and liking the sour fruit that goes with it. Its complex, slightly unbalanced and surprising. Much like a lot of people I know and care about.

In conclusion then, I like this beer, but its nothing like what I expected. Its acidic bitterness is odd yet not unpleasant, but its aroma is hardly enticing and its probably not worth the price. If you had never tasted saison before I'm not sure you'd try it again after this - but if you had, I fear like me you'd spend all your time wondering why it wasn't as good as the Urthel for example - or the stupendous Dark Star cask Saison, which was epic.
 

The answer to the conundrum then? Now I think I know less about saison and more about expectation than I did before. I thought all saisons were meant to be fresh and lemony and delicately sweet and were brewed for farm workers (apologies if I have walked into some obvious beer writers in joke here!). Fantome is none of those things. And I have no confidence in the idea that the previous statement means this is not a proper saison beer either!
 

I can't even work out if that's good....

 

 

Wee Beefy
 

Sun Fest 2012 at the Rising Sun

Hello,

      yesterday I braved the threat of downpours and the rigmarole of travelling right across the city to go to the Rising Sun beer festival "Sun Fest" on Fulwood Road, Nether Green. The festival is still on today all day by the way.

One thing I noticed straight away was that it was in fact, sunny. it really was bathed in the golden glow of sunshine as I arrived, and to my surprise, it didn't rain apart from a spot or two all the time I was there. Well done to the organisers for dabbling in a bit of harmless dark arts to ward away the rain.

The other thing I noticed was it was rammed. I got there earlier than planned at just gone 5PM but it was twenty minutes before I got my first drink. Since the festival had grown inexorably since my last visit I assumed any one of the four tents I could see would house the beers but the beer tent is behind the ones visible. I found it by following people with empty glasses, then got directions to the ticket tent, and then queued 5 deep at the bar.

I envisaged this might at least keep me sober if nothing else, but at 15 minutes a drink I wondered if I'd clear my £8.00 token card before closing time. The card, if you haven't been before, is basically circles indicating a pound and squares for 5 and 10p amounts which are marked off with a pen every time you buy. You can hand the cards back in if they are unfilled and get the money back or donate them to the festival Charity.

Anyhoo, my fears proved misplaced since it soon became obvious that the sea of punters ebbed and flowed liked the tide. The next half I went to buy took less than a minute., walking straight up to the bar and getting served. By now I also worked out that the references against each beer were U, M, L and B, meaning their height on the stillage, and the numbers ran numerically from left to right. So to save time you could, usually, head for where you knew the beer was. Ingenious.

I bumped into Steve, erstwhile scholar and libator from the Red Deer the other night, and we got chatting and making our way through the beers. On my first card I tried the following :

Brown Cow Cowasaki Pale, 4.3
Barley Bottom Cobbydale Stout 4.0
Downton Apple Blossom Ale 4.3
Dark Star Saison 4.5
Oates Golden Oates 4.1
Raw Dark Peak Reserve 2011 6.0

The latter beer took me onto my next card, and was a useful tool in guiding my mate to a next beer. Because by this time I'd been joined by Carlos, Wee Keefy and Jambon and they were made aware straight away of the tricks, idiosyncrasies and rules and set out to get refreshments. Carlos found it ten thick at the bar inside so his quest for a pint of lager was thwarted, but we had noticed there were some Keykeg beers including a Hop Studio Pilsner, so we sent him to the tent to get some.

Unfortunately, after we had secured ale, he was told after about 10 minutes queueing that the lagers were only served in the pub, even though this was listed on the beer list as being in the tent (I have studiously re-read every word and it doesn't state its in the pub). Luckily he'd had a taste of the Dark Peak and had that but considering that the Kirkstall Framboise was on in the tent this omission didn't make sense.  Surely, put all the Abbeydale ones in the bar plus two or three in the tent, (as they did), and all the festival beers, including Keykegs in the tent? If you queue for ten minutes for a beer that all along was at the end of a totally different queue that's poor.

Anyhoo, this annoyance was tempered by the realisation that Carlos had a taste for some darker beers so he got to try the excellent Kirkstall Black Band Porter and the legendary Abbeydale Black Mass.

The rest of my tipples were :

Tydd Steam Golden Kiwi 4.1
Crouch Vale Yakima Gold 4.2
Dark Star Revelation 5.7
 Abbeydale Black Mass 6.66

I didn't fancy finishing on the Black Lurcher (not that its particularly much stronger than the Black Mass...) but anything dark delicious and dangerous is ideal for the final drink so the Mass was an obvious choice.

Black Mass action

Highlights of the festival beer wise were Crouch Vale Citra, Barley Bottom Cobbydale Stout, Dark Star Saison and Revelation and my favourite beer of the festival was the Raw Dark Peak Reserve. That said, there wasn't a beer I didn't enjoy, and the range was excellent. It was also interesting to note the benefits and drawbacks of gravity dispense - the Revelation was far better than on handpump, but the Saison not so good. Does this realisation sound familiar in terms of vessels chosen to dispense from?

And finally, I have to say, considering the huge numbers of punters, the volunteers behind the bar did the unenviable job of serving everyone about as quickly as was possible with admirable efficiency and patience.

So that was my visit to the 2012 Sun Fest, another triumph of beers and space and luck with the weather. As I said its still on today so get yourself up there and try some of what's left.

Cheers!

Wee Beefy

Dangerously drinkable

Afternoon,

  this is just a quick mention of a few pints I had last night, showing two contrasting beers, but both eminently drinkable, and excellent examples of their styles.

Not a Shakey Start

Starting at Shakespeares I was dallying with having a Raw Solstice pale, or having a reliable and slightly less expensive pint of Deception, until I noticed, to my delight, that Dark Star Saison was on. Having been my clear winner of the beer of the festival at Three Valleys (no mean feat in the face of some of the Raw, Buxton and Ashover offerings), I was chuffed to see it, and despite the cantankerous weather Gods serving up wind, hail and sunshine all at once it was still relatively warm, so Saison was the ideal choice.

To liven up the experience I should really have bought a bottle of Saison de Silly to compare - instead, putting my droughty gullet before hard research I just bought another half of the Saison and a typically Belgian delicacy, of a pork pie and some Beefy crisps. A tremendously Flemish approach to refreshment I'm sure you'll agree....

I had bought another half because I was conscious of the fact that the Saison would not linger long in my glass. I was right. Pint number one barely passed a five minute lifetime. More was required. So I had a further two pints of this nectar before moving on, once again leaving Shakespeares having had a memorable drinking experience. Full marks.

Cranes

Up next to the Cranes, as per Beer matters now leased by Rick and Luke and featuring Blue Bee as usual and more Vale. Initially I was stopping only for a half, and had the Welbeck Abbey Portland Black. A terrific super dark roasted malt tribute of a beer, that tasted far too fantastic to fanny about having only a half. So I had another.

The fact that I only stopped for one more half was down to a desire to get myself home like a good boy and cook tea instead of getting hammered, however had I not had so pious a calling I think I would have been in there for a good few more, such was the excellence of the Portland Black.

Am off out later and really really hope both beers are still on. And Rick tells me that they are going to try and stay open late on Friday and Saturday nights when, surprisingly, its actually quiet, so maybe I'll get the chance of another Portland Black at least.




Cheers!

Wee Beefy