Beer in Review: Moinette Belgian Ale

*Sigh*

The day job has been taking its toll on the night job. As a result, the night job (aka, BetterBeerBlog) has been suffering. Thankfully, there are some new beers in my near future as well as another beer festival that we’re stretching out into a long weekend. In addition to all the work piling up, I am attending the first ever Twitter Conference this week. So far, I have mixed feelings about the conference. The slant is developer-based but there are a few things consumer/marketing that look promising. I can tell you this, the Twitter community is very passionate about Twitter. You’ll see a lot of “twittiquette” posts here and there talking about the “proper” ways to Twitter and they’re all a load of crap. Use Twitter the way you want to, it’s as simple as that. Anyway, this is not a Twitter blog but a beer blog so let’s get to the beers.

Moinette Belgian Pale Ale, Brasserie Dupont, 8.5% ABV

Brasserie Dupont is a Belgian Brewery out of Tourpes Leuze. They make many a good beer but I think they might be best known for their Saison Dupont, a Belgian farmhouse ale. Most of their beers are bottle conditioned making them real ales. Depending on what link you click on when you run a Google search, this beer will either be a Belgian Blonde Ale or a Belgian Strong Pale Ale.

Moinette pours out a cloudy, dark gold color with a lasting, creamy looking off-white head. The beer has a sweet-ish malt aroma with a very pleasant fruit component. I can also detect slight honey notes as well as the alcohol. The beer is pretty well balanced. There is a noticeable hop flavor that is slightly spicy while the hop bitterness is much more than what the aroma would have you believe. Even then, it’s only about a medium hop bitterness. I can also taste hints of fruit. Moinette is highly carbonated with a medium/medium-full body. The beer is also a little dry on the palette. Even though this beer is 8.5% ABV, it hides its alcohol well.

This is a most excellent beer. Despite my the clinical nature of my review, this beer has a surprisingly depth and layering of flavors that is unexpected. Then again, I really shouldn’t be surprised by anything the Belgians do with their beers. I should just have faith, I’ve never been let down yet.

Note: I took these photos using the built-in webcam on my computer. It shows. I just wanted to try something different and actually have my mug in the pics. At least I’m not doing some sort of strip tease on the webcam. Be thankful for that!

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