Abbaye St-Remy's Trappistes Rochefort 10

I stopped trying Belgians by the time this one was widely available in Houston, but I couldn't pass it up for one reason, here about a month ago.

Nice, deep smell. Not terribly bready like I'd expect, but deep ad not hoppy. Slightly fizzy smell to it. Tan head didn't stick around too long, but didn't disappear immediately, either.

Big feel to it, like a quad should have. Fairly strong alcohol taste, which isn't unexpected from an 11.3% ABV, but I wish it was hidden a little better. I know a lot of people would talk about dark fruits when describing this beer, but I refuse to. It has a deep, slow taste to it, with a wet cigar tobacco aftertaste.

Excellent beer. Trappists know what they're doing.

Saint Arnold's Divine Reserve No. 2

A few days ago I was at a friend's house, and he's not as much of a fan of beer like I am so he asked if I wanted to sift through some of the beers he's been given over the last few years. We were cleaning out his "cellar," which like mine is a cramped space in the pantry that the wife lets me keep mainly because she doesn't know how to use that space, but unlike mine is a mess of random Budweiser-ish beers for the most part. So I was passing over many of them, but coming up with a decent one here and there, as was he.

He got to it first, saying something along the lines of "Hey, what's this? It's from Saint Arnold's, but it's just got a number two on it. What's Divine Reserve?"

"You said I could have anything in here I wanted. And I want that," was the first thing I could think of. I missed this one when it was first released, and have been wanting to fill in the gaps in my Divine Reserve tastings. Having been brewed over two years ago in a series that is brewed only once and never returns, I was prepared to be pissed if he went back on his word. He didn't though, so I brought it home to try tonight.

It pours a heavy, murky, slow, unfiltered amberish brown with almost no head that's quickly gone. It's opaque, but moreso in the middle of the glass.

Great Belgian quad smell, slow and sweet, with a soft, bready malt smell touched off by a background of molasses, a hint of aged fruit, and a bit of alcohol.

The alcohol hits you right up front, but quickly mellows into a deep, dark bread taste with more aged fruit and a hint of spice that I wouldn't call clove but is subdued and slightly aromatic.

If you've read my recent entries you know I'm no longer a fan of Belgians, and although this has been fermented with American yeast as well, it's a Belgian Quad at heart. I like it though. Maybe the half-and-half nature of the fermentation did it for me.