Brewery: Brasserie Grain d’Orge
Country: Frankrike
Size: 33cl
ABV: 5.5%
Price: 21kr
Systembolaget: 1500
So this was a bit of a random selection from Systembolaget. For the ecological beer tasting I wanted a pale ale and I stumbled upon this whilst browsing their website. When I pick the beers for my beer club meetings, I have a number of options. Sometimes I take beers from companies whose products I have tried previously or that have been recommended to me by a friend. Other time I go just by appearance and may buy a beer because the label is really eye-catching and exciting. Now and again it is also nice to just take pot luck and just hope for the best. This way you can end up with something completely unexpected, such as this example. I thought it was going to get a rather standard pale ale but ended up with some weird, mead like sweet ale.
The can itself couldn’t look more generic if it tried. Dull mustard yellow and gold with a dull font and dull pictures. This can is the aesthetic cure for insomnia. The beer was clear and bright golden with very low carbonation and a head that held a while. It smelt quite mild, with the light aroma being earthy yet sweet at the same time. Hints of honey, moss, wet soil and clementine peel all surfaced during the smelling. The taste was definitely not what I expected from this pale ale. It was surprisingly sweet and cloying on the tongue, even though the body was pretty thin. Honey was the main hit along with syrup, maple syrup and sap. It was a slight phenolic edge too with a light bitterness that took a long time to make itself known.
This was a strange beer it must be said. I expected a lot more hops and a lot less honey character. It was more like drinking some sort of thin, sweet mead than the usual pale ales I’m used to. This beer was gluten-free but it was also free of character and any sort of excitement. I couldn’t really recommend this unless you really like your beer tasting like thin, malty honey. Yawn.