Friday, April 06, 2007

The Session #2: Dubbel Bubbel

(Apologies for the title, Dubbel Bubbel...heheh. No disrespect ;-) Yes, it's that time again, the first Friday of the month. Don't forget to check out Alan's page at A Good Beer Blog. He is collecting all the dubbel posts for The Session this time. To read more about The Session check out Stan's page Appellation Beer where the idea was conceived. Thanks to my in-laws, my wife and I were able to go "out on the town" a bit tonight. This made this "The Session" a bit more interesting than the last. Since there were no other ideas, I took the opportunity to search out some good beer at four, yes four, local bars. I have more to say about that in another post, but, this is about one beer from that night, Westmalle's Trappist Dubbel. This is only the second time I've had this beer so I was looking forward to getting to know it a bit better. I found it at The Drafting Room in Exton, PA. We ordered a piece of apple pie, a glass of water and the dubbel. It came in a 11.5 oz. bottle with a glass that closed toward the top. The Drafting Room seems to pay very close attention to the glassware. A bit too dark to judge the color. Lotsa bubbles and a big head to start. After that the head diminishes to little islands of bubbles. The nose had a yeasty hint of fruitiness about it. Next came the soft mouth feel which carried this bubbly liquid bread around my mouth. Everytime I have a belgian like this I think about how well it would go with food. Not overstated; not understated. After the first taste, I decided that it would probably compliment the pie with its Grannysmith apples sliced thin and piled up high covered with sweet crumbly cinnamon and brown sugar topping. I was right. The Westmalle didn't steal the show. It didn't get lost in the brown sugar and apples. It complimented them. A beer a tad sweeter would probably make a better pairing, but, I'm splitting hairs here. So what did it taste like? It was subtle in a way that a water color painting can be subtle. Light malt, super light dried figs, very light pepper from the alcohol and well a subtle bready yeastiness that really enticed me to have more, but, alas our "night out" was coming to a close. Are all dubbels like this? I don't know, I don't drink them that often or maybe I just don't remember. I'm interested to hear what others have to say about the dubbel they tasted. I want to know how a beer can be so soft, subtle, complex and all out delicious in a liquid bread sorta way at the same time. I guess the question is, "Should all dubbels taste like this?" By the way, my wife didn't like it. She did like the Southern Tier Java Stout we tasted earlier in the evening. Ah well, more for me ;-)

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