Kerstbier Fest 2010 at the Trappist, let the winter beers roll! First up, a Norwegian craft brewer that sees very good distribution in the Bay Area and long has been on my list to explore further. I
loved last year's effort, and this year's
Nøgne Ø God Jul (8.5%) offers rich raisined fantastic prunes on the nose and tastes like (or at least reminds me of) a frothy fuller version of Dogfish Head's Palo Santo Marron--though I like this quite a bit better. Onto the province of Hainaut in French-speaking parts of Belgium for the classic
Dubuisson Scaldis Noël (12%), a dry-hopped Christmas beer which indeed offers plenty of spiciness on both the nose and palate but some rich caramel notes as well. A beer with a strong personality, the fave of my housemate and I took quite a fancy to it as well. This year's 2010 Anchor Christmas has a kick-ass nose of complex spiciness and dark dried fruit, spicy dark delicious and easily drunk. Gyspy-brewing and Christmas beer specialist Mikkeller from Denmark is another local scenester and the
2009 Mikkeller Santa's Little Helper, ironically enough, felt like it needed even more time to develop! Muted nose, very firm and very rich on the palate. Slightly grainy and harder to read. Meanwhile the
Mikkeller From Via To had a very tight diesel/rhubarb nose and tasted really intense and really concentrated. More like a digestiv than like a beer, very interesting. Back to Belgium for the
2008 Achoffe N'ice Chouffe (10%) which interestingly did not entice me as it did
last year - red sweet colaesque, simple. Perhaps suffered after the intensity of the Mikkeller (order is always a challenge at these beerfests!). So back to Mikkelller I go for the
Mikkeller Red/White Christmas, a blend of red ale and witbier--which certainly strikes a lot of interesting notes, especially on the nose, and has a tinge of quaffable savory notes. Really liked the way this expanded my palate and made my mouth water. The relatively local
Moonlight Santa's Tipple from Fulton (about an hour north of here) is dark and roasted, very clean and slightly meaty, this is really pleasant stuff to just sit and drink. Finally the
Struise Tsjeeses (10%), a new wave Belgian brewer that's been making a lot of visits to my glass recently, came at a point in the evening where my judgment was well into the impaired territory, but spiced delicious complexity comes to mind. Much lighter yet very flavorful. Another year's work done!
