Westmalle Christmas Gift: Delayed Review, Sorry!

Trappist beers are brewed by Trappist monks within the walls of a Trappist monastery, this one founded in 1794, becoming an abbey in 1836, and Westmalle beers, brewed at the Brouwerij der Trappisten van Westmalle (brewing since 1836 - website), are up there amongst the best beers of Belgium. Although the monks no longer brew the beers themselves, they are still in overall charge of the brewery, ensuring tradition is upkept, and pure ingredients used, their own water, 100% barley malt, hops, and yeast from their own culture. All these are bottle-conditioned.

I had never tasted the just 4.8% Westmalle Extra before, but this light golden blonde is based on the ale recipe first brewed by the monks for their own consumption in 1836. OK, not as pronounced a flavour and impact as the double the strength Tripel described below, which means it is a bit more of a 'supping' beer. But it is recognisably a Westmalle beer, with a Westmalle aroma, and hints of banana and pineapple in the taste, very nice!

The penultimate beer I drank was the 7.0% Dubbel, a dark deep red colour, first brewed nearly 100 years ago in 1926. This has a rich dried dark fruit aroma, and at first tastes slightly sour, then sweet, with malt and dark fruits, but dries out with a slightly bitter finish, very decent.

The best 'til last, and my favourite regularly available Belgian ale, Westmalle Tripel (image immediately above), which I have written about many times before (eg blog). The Tripel, is a 9.5% golden beer, with a subtle fruitiness and quite dry and bitter finish, quite frankly, excellent! There are a number of bars in Brussels where I would always drink this, the waiting staff in the magnificent Le Cirio in Brussels, by la Bourse, always taking care not to disturb the sediment, but leaving the bottle for people to add the sediment if they so wished. Indeed, the owner of the bar closest to where my brother used to live always called me "Monsieur Westmalle", but that bar, sadly, is no longer open, the owner having retired.

You will appreciate just how much I loved this Christmas present brought back from Belgium by my brother, he knows what I like, the beer and the glass, cheers Dan! 👍