8.8

Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 9 | Flavor - 8.5 | Texture - 9 | Overall - 9

Pours hazed blonde. Small white head. Scent is mature, bit whisky, tart, funky and woody. Taste is full, intense, tart, funky, woody, whisky in amazing balance. Tad 'sweet' almost, by the barrel - but ends very dry. Exceptionally well made and without a doubt thé masterpiece of LF (so far?) Absolutely great value for money here !

7.5

Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 8 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 7

11/XII/22 - 75cl bottle from Geers (Oostakker), shared @ home, BB: n/a, bottled: III/2021 (2022-1733)

Clear to little cloudy blond yellow beer (weird enough I was expecting this to be more orange, like a flat lambic, don’t know why though), big creamy to aery white head, pretty stable, non adhesive. Aroma: nice, fruity, some oranges, oxidized, a little funky, spicy. MF: ok carbon, medium body. Taste: fruity start, pretty bitter, sharp, some acidity, sweet touch, apricots and peaches. Aftertaste: alcohol, pretty sharp, sweet touch, some honey, a bit funky, fruity touch, bitter, tannins, ok but not really great.

7.6

Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 8.5 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 7 | Overall - 7.5

Bottle. Bit hazy golden. Lots of funk, red apple, alcohol, vanilla, caramel, soft sugar syrup. Solid sweet and medium sour. Over medium bodied. Quite heavy, but doesn’t seem like 11% abv.

7

Üllatavalt mahe, ütleks isegi magus, puuviljane, nisune, linnaseline, alkone, natuke happeline, tsitrus-apelsin. Lõpus on ikka soojendav alks. Ok, ootasin selgelt midagi teistsugust...

8.5

Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 8.5 | Flavor - 8.5 | Texture - 9 | Overall - 8.5

Lambiek Fabriek's latest to date, an impressively strong lambic aged on Gouden Carolus whisky barrels - the famed Gouden Carolus brand in Mechelen has indeed been producing whisky for years, and word went out on the grapevine that they offered their whisky barrels to a select number of fine brewers to age their beer in (Verzet is another one of those). Gunsmoke coming out of the bottle after opening, followed by 'belated' gushing - but nothing too violent. Audibly crackling, beaten egg-white, thickly moussy, large-bubbled but relatively stable head, pale ochre-golden blonde robe, misty with lively sparkling. Aroma of indeed clear Gouden Carolus whisky (I had it some years ago when it first came out), incorporating this banana, candied pineapple and vanilla effect into a lambic context, mingling with peaches soaked in alcohol, wild apple, damp straw, stale lime juice, wood sorrel, dust, unripe nectarine, wet vanilla-like oak wood, peanuts soaked in white wine vinegar, green pear, dry sherry. Lively onset, very estery and mildly tart, yoghurty lactic acidity in a gentle way, lots of sparkling effervescence; impressions of gooseberry, cooked green apple and unripe nectarine, with even hints of ripe white grape and banana coming from the Gouden Carolus whisky. Soft and full, almost 'fluffy' body, lovely brioche-breadiness under drying and notably vinous tartness with a deep oaky woodiness to it - but then the sweetness of this particular whisky gains momentum, with this very memorable yellow fruit effect coming in (banana even), mellowing the overall tartness of the lambic. The Gouden Carolus whisky flavour is all around here, including its soothing alcohol warmth, vanilla scent and sweet yellow fruitiness, but so is Lambiek Fabriek's home lambic quality - and both unexpectedly merge into one whole. Ends warming and almost sweet-sour, but most importantly: ends successfully. I never would have imagined even after having tasted all their previous lambics, but the Lambiek Fabriek crew managed to achieve something I have long considered impossible, despite notorious attempts by Cantillon and 3 Fonteinen: they made me enjoy a lambic with an ABV over 10%. With this achievement in mind, in cannot but grant this Colon-Elle a formidably high score - and the bottle was still young, imagine what this becomes with a few years of cellaring on it...

8.4

Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 8 | Flavor - 8.5 | Texture - 9 | Overall - 8.5

Good, just yellowish head over hazy yellow-golden beer. Very dry woody, the spirit very traceable immediately. Sweet-ish. Again spirit, but I would have guessed brandy rather than Bourbon; the usual vanilla just turns it a tad sweet in a boozy (but good) way. Dryness of the lambic is perfectly counterbalanced by the brandy. Raisins, sultanas. Good carbonation! Light acidthinning, but still quite slick. Despite the booze, one would never guess 11%. And yet another tour-de-force from the tastiest factory in the world.