Following the mild controversy generated by my last
review, I’ve decided to retreat to a beer with which the probability of a
response from a brewery employee is low.
This is the first of a two-part review covering both Westvleteren 6
beers, and launches a broader intermittent series on the Trappists.
I found that the previous series on Baltic porters an interesting
departure from reviewing random beers, so I’ve decided to start another.
Westvleteren, of course, is one of the six or seven
(depending on how one chooses to count) Trappist monasteries that brews beer.
This is the rarest of the lot. While
labels like Chimay and La Trappe seem to be ubiquitous, Westvleteren is
difficult to find in the U.S. Although
easier to find in Belgium and The Netherlands, it remains relatively scarce.
The most distinctive feature of Westvleteren, besides their scarcity,
is that the bottles are unadorned with a label.
The beer is identified only by the cap.
The yellow cap is the monster of the bunch, also known as the 12 or abt.
A blue cap identifies the 8, while the lightest of the bunch, the 6,
has a green cap. This replaces
the red cap 6.
I came to Westvleteren relatively late in my education,
which is not surprising considering the paucity of this beer in the U.S.
generally, and the Pacific Northwest specifically.
I had my first Westy, the 12, in 1998 when Bruce Reistle generously
offered me two when he spent the night at my house in Seattle.
Obviously, this is a great beer, so I decided to seek it out when I
first visited Belgium later that year. That
year, I found the 8 and 12 fairly available in the right places, but the 6
remained elusive, only available at Bier Circus.
This makes sense considering the limited distribution network of
Westvleteren.
This review focuses on the “old” red cap version of
the six, which is, to my understanding, no longer available.
I was unable to find it in Brussels in 2000, and a visit to Bierkoning
in Amsterdam last Saturday found that they sell the green cap, but not the
red.
The 6 is the lightest of the brewery’s three offerings,
at 6.2% ABV (The green is even lighter, at 4.5%).
Little seems to be done to remove the yeast from this beer; it is
unfiltered and not centrifuged if I recall correctly.
The careful procedure of pouring this beer is familiar to homebrewers.
The Belgians are exacting about matching the beer to the appropriate
glass, and Bier Circus takes this to the next level, as I was able to enjoy
this beer in a Westvleteren glass. Highly
carbonated, a foamy, fluffy head forms above the light brown beer.
Clarity is neither bright nor hazy, but somewhere in between.
This is a very interesting beer.
The malt and fruitiness dominates, but not to the same degree as the
super strong Trappists (e.g. Rochefort 10, Westvleteren 12). This is a drinking beer, not a sipping beer, and a
surprisingly good quaffer. Due to
its scarcity, I only had two in several visits to Bier Circus; I didn’t want
to drink it all myself.
