8.9

Appearance - 9 | Aroma - 8.5 | Flavor - 8.5 | Texture - 9 | Overall - 9.5

Interesting and highly profiled (as well as quite expensive) blend of Johnnie Walker barrel aged quadrupel with Chivas Regal barrel aged 'smoked imperial brown ale' and bourbon barrel aged 'imperial red ale', one in a series of prestigious and ambitious 'bières de dégustation' by this trusted family brewery in the eastern Netherlands. Comes with fancy box, which is apparently used for all these Curiosité variants. Shared by Craftmember in honour of his birthday - cheers to that, Vincent! Pale greyish-beige, tiny-bubbled, open and eventually dissolving head, deep chocolate brown robe with copper red glow, clear at first but misty in the end. Beguiling bouquet of ground hazelnuts, Pumpernickel bread, toffee, lots of vanilla-scenting oak wood, walnut liqueur, dried prunes, pear, cinnamon, candied fig, some smoky whisky in the background, fainter but equally alluring notes of black cherry, dried apricot, liquorish, bourbon-soaked raisins, ketjap manis and dried porcini. Sweet onset without any stickiness, concentrated with a slight sourish edge, impressions of fig, pear and ripe red plum with a dash of ripe blackberry, softish carbonation with rounded, full mouthfeel; complex, primarily hazelnutty and toffeeish malt body with nougat-, caramel- and even lightly chocolate-like sides, as well as toasty accent (I suppose from that imperial red ale). The smoky part of the 'smoked imperial brown ale' (whatever that may be) remains very faint, but is still detectable retronasally. Lots of noble, vanilla-scented oakiness graces a long, soothing, complex finish, in which the layers of nutty and caramelly malts show off their best, adorned with residual candi sugar sweetness, raisin and dried fig notes and warming, evidently single malt- and bourbon-like alcohol, which warms persistently without burning. Hops are hidden below all these structures, providing balance against the sweetness without explicitly revealing themselves, as it ought to be in this kind of strong ale. Profound, multi-sided ('kaleidoscopic'), majestic winter warmer - far above any other Bronckhorster beer I had to date. If this is the level of quality this Curiosité series offers, then I can only regret having missed out on earlier editions, and remain eager to try more of them. Truly superb quadrupel - of sorts.