Saison Imperiale
Brewmaster’s Collection Special Reserve
Saison Imperiale was created as a bolder more flavorful interpretation of the style. This is a deep amber colored beer with active carbonation forming a large tan head. The beer is fermented with two yeasts - the traditional ale yeast Sacchoromyces along with a light touch of the lambic-like Brettanomyces yeast, yielding a mild earthiness sometimes referred to as "farmhouse character." On the palate the yeasts and hops initially combine for fruity and spicy notes, followed by a semi-sweet caramel medium bodied depth and richness from the malt. A truly unique saison experience.
Saison Imperiale was created as a bolder more flavorful interpretation of the style. This is a deep amber colored beer with active carbonation forming a large tan head. The beer is fermented with two yeasts - the traditional ale yeast Sacchoromyces along with a light touch of the lambic-like Brettanomyces yeast, yielding a mild earthiness sometimes referred to as "farmhouse character." On the palate the yeasts and hops initially combine for fruity and spicy notes, followed by a semi-sweet caramel medium bodied depth and richness from the malt. A truly unique saison experience.
3.4
284 reviews
Hijfte, Belgium
Community reviews
Hazy brown with a quickly fading off white head. Aroma is slightly tart apple, raisin, caramel, and a hint of wood. Taste is apple, earthy, malty, and a little funk. Very sweet overall. Flat with little carbonation.
Interesting saison -- bolder than others in sour/wildness. A little oaky too!
Bottle. Pours a dark orange with large frothy off white head that lasts awhile leaving sticky lacing along the glass. The aroma is an earthy yeast and citrus. Medium mouthfeel with a sweet fruit and light caramel malt with nice light spice finish. A good saison from De Proef.
Bottle. Pours dark amber with a medium sized tan head. Fig, fruits, caramel and yeast aroma. Medium sweet flavor with hops and carbonation to balance. Med-light body, good carbonation, creamy texture, and an oily bitter finish. The appearance and nose suggest malt sweetness, but there are plenty of hops in there. I agree with the style classification as the mouthfeel is there, but could also go as a Belgian Strong ale. It’s a very good beer nonetheless.
Fruit, wood, and a little sour funk in the aroma. Flavor is sweet and fruity, with a little sour and alcohol bite in the finish. Good, but not great.
Pours darker than you expect for a saison, but most other characteristics in appearance match. Aroma has all the fruity notes, but no real funk beyond the typical belgian yeast. I think the imperial part puts it closer to a belgian strong than a saison. Good balance in the spice, but lacking the funk to make it farmhouse. Alcohol is present but not overbearing. Pretty good.
Bottle from Julios. A deep medium amber with a light tan head. Big sweet fruity aromas. Flavor is deep sweet and malty. Raison notes. Some yeasty fruit. Medium to heavy body, but very smooth and drinkable. Not too sweet. Reminds me a lot of Raison d’etre by DFH. Low bitterness, but well balanced. Clean, fruity finish. Warming as it goes down. More of a Belgian Strong Ale than any Saison I’ve ever tried.
750 ml bottle into tulip glass, no bottle dating. Pours very hazy very dark reddish brown color with a small 1 finger foamy off white head with good retention, that reduces to a small cap that lingers. Decent spotty lacing clings on the glass. The cork hardly popped when I opened it, probably pushing 4 years or more in age. Aromas of caramel, toffee, molasses, prune, raisin, toast, pepper, earth, and big phenolic yeast esters. Aromas aren’t very pleasant at all; very stale and unbalanced feeling. Taste of caramel, toffee, molasses, prune, toast, biscuit, raisin, earth, herbal, grass, and light yeast spiciness. Lingering notes of caramel, molasses, toffee, toast, biscuit, dark fruits, herbal, earth, and light yeast spices on the finish for a good bit. Pretty good flavor balance and complexity; but it feels more like a Belgian dark ale than a saison. Flavors were not as robust as I was expecting; no cloying sweetness. Medium carbonation and medium-full bodied; with a fairly creamy and slick mouthfeel that is good. Alcohol is very well hidden with pretty much no warming noticed at all after the finish. Overall this is a pretty solid dark Belgian saison. The aromas were pretty bad, but the taste turned out alright. Fairly enjoyable, if only they dated these bottles.
Grape & Gourmet, VA Beach 750ml ($10): Pours an orange body with a white frothy head. Aroma is not conventional saison at all: actually, it resembles a Belgian Strong Ale much more. Dark fruity aromas make up most of the nose. Taste is pretty sweet, with an intense fruitiness. There is no funk and barely any trace of saison yeast. I had high hopes for this beer, but it turned out to disappoint.
Bottle - small foamy head, hazy deep amber color, nice balanced aroma and flavor with sweet malt and Belgian yeast - definitely darker than I expected being a saison, good though and different
A cheaper saison that is nice to have around the house. A light head with rich spices and overall good balance.
Sampled from a 750 ml corked brown bottle this beer poured a dark orange-caramel color with a medium sized foamy off white head that left good lacing. The aroma was dryish and chalky with light tangy candied golden fruits. The flavor was sweettart candies, chalk and was fairly dry with herbs and pepper underneath. The finish was long, chalky and had lingering pepper and citrus. Medium body. Eh.
Hazy Amber pour with big off-white head.
Nose is dusty with hint of sweet malt and earthy yeasts
Sweet Maple Syrup in front to an alcohol tinged bitter finish.
meh.
Hazy brown with bubbly beige head, medium-full body with medium carbonation.
Chocolate malt, yeast, and some citrusy esters and smokey phenols.
Funkiness is muted and sourness is not there. Too sweet and yeasty.
750ml bottle poured into snifter. Grabbed this off the shelf at my local Total Wine to share with some buds. Golden color with a nice spicy/yeasty aroma. Flavor had slight hints of fruit and yeast. Middle of the road beer, good but not spectacular.
Bready yeasty aroma from an amber pour with a big off white head. The flavor is a bit too sweet for me, root beer like. There is some Belgian yeast present along with a good deal of booze. Finishes fairly dry with a long lasting after taste. A little less sweet and it would be in my top ten for the style.
750 ml. bottle. Pours a deep, hazy amber with frothy, creamy off-white head. Aroma has strong notes of farmhouse, musty, citrus, faint hints of toasted grain, light acidic. Flavor is very much the same. Mouth feel is medium body with high, fizzy carbonation. Overall, solid brew!
750 ml. bottle. Served at cellar temperature. Pours a medium, lasting off white head of long duration, with attractive lacing, over a clear amber ((SRM 9) body....nose is heavy sweet malts with raisin, plum tones, light molasses, brown sugar....taste is sweet malts with light dried fruits ( raisin, fig) finishing with a harsh fusel alcohol tones along with light allspice, pepper.....mouth feel is light, carbonation low. Except for the fusel heat, which is partially hidden by the pepper/spice tones, this is a reasonable attempt at a Saison. It is definitely not one of the best, but let this open up, it really improves. BJCP 7/3/12/4/7
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Obfuscated rust color, stiff buff foam and mediocre lacing. Potent grape, bubblegum, and cherry licorice nose; a concentrated candy smell. Some peach and vanilla afternotes. Flavors of Tootsie Roll, plum and coughdrop… some crabapple acidity… a shortlived phenolic and somewhat acrid aftertaste. Thick creamy mouthfeel more befitting an oatmeal stout; low carbonation. Completely not what I expected from saison in any incarnation. Sweet, dimensionless and boring.
750ml bottle pours a redish amber beer with a lacey white head. Aroma is somewhat sweet with notes of banana, dark fruits and tons of malts. Taste is close to an oak aged sour ale but not as strong very well balanced. A little fruity but a great beer that is easy to drink and a great flavor.
Appearance: deep ruddy reds with a few dreggy globules hovering near the bottom. Pinkish head thick and tightly packed eventually fades into a thick color surrounding a broken patch of film. Blood-orange around the edges. Swirls with minimal lace.
Nose: sweet, spicy. Intense almost pungent nose ripe in coffee cake and cinnamon rolls, gentle sugary sweetness, prunes, dried dates, preserved apricots and peaches. Maple with brown sugar. Must whispers in and out of the back. Spiced apples and nutmeg amidst cakey doughy breakfast breads. Laffy taffy.
Palate: wow and wow. Not as heavy in weight as her massive nose impressed but also nowhere near lacking in flavor complexity. Musty dry finish of old wood and leather. Soft frothy mouthfeel thanks to bottle-conditioning lifts her palate up and keeps her hovering over the tastebuds. Toffee, taffy, maple, brown sugar, and candied apples. Touch of dense fruitcake underneath. Candied maraschino cherries and pineapple. Coconut shavings. Nutmeg and spice lingers long in my breath. Pecans and hazelnuts dabble in and out while treacle joins her sweet side. Coffee cake and cinnamon rolls for sweetness, chewy doughy breads, and spice. Flavors blend together very well.
Final Thoughts: what I got was not what I was expecting, but what I got was also very good. Reminded me more of a Flanders inspired saison ala Biere de Garde versus the Belgian saison. Either way, mighty tasty. Would love to have a chalice of this with breakfast sometime.
Amber with large head. Aroma muted by head but with some spices and yeast. Body a little lighter than expected, not much carbonation, I don’t notice the alcohol until after finishing half the bottle. Flavors with some spice, pumpkin, esters, a little bit of hops bitterness. Overall it seemed surprisingly thin with interesting flavors but almost diluted, I don’t know if I didn’t have a good bottle or something and should try again but was expecting more, also not really indentifiable as a saison.
Bottle, A nice amber hue with red highlights, a nice white head and good carbonation. Aroma had a nice fruity presence along with some banana, clove and biscuit malts. Flavor seemed to have a good fruity note that had almost a tannin like quality to it. Some nice grassy hops were present. Carbonation was present, but not overpowering.
Sampled today 09/05/10. Slightly sour taste, golden color, refreshing and tasty.
Bottle. Pours opaque caramel color with nice head. Smells like roasted wheat. The taste is like an interesting sweet and sour and spiced mix of a saison and a stout, though it is quite refreshing and drinks like a saison. Aftertaste of pumpkin pie and vanilla...
(bottle at Sean’s Unibroue tasting). Pours caramel color with light off-white head. Aroma of caramel and apple. Taste is sweet and somewhat sour. Light bodied and thin, the beer was fizzy on the tongue and finished sour. Nice unique saison.
A: pours a rather opaque tawny color. great thick head, slightly tan head/ great retention rate and solid lacing.
S: aromas of cinnamon and nutmeg, wonderful fall fruits, apples, green raisins and dates. nice funk in the aroma.
T: green raisins, nutmeg, cinnamon, some serious fall fruits, apples and pears. very funky. some alcohol notes. I also get some blueberry notes.
M: very well balanced ale, smooth and creamy mouth feel, slight alcohol burn. good mellow carbonation level.
pretty nice Saison, but there are a lot better ones out there. Aroma is hay with some light apple elements. Appearance is a light amber with a white head and nice lacing. Taste is vanilla and apple. Palate is dry but a bit creamy. A decent saison.
Courtesy of Blazer06. Pours murky deep copper with thin tan head. The aroma has notes of sweat socks, berry fruitiness, tannins, sweatier socks and then some spices. The taste is tart fruit skin tannins, tartness and some odd funky chemical sourness. Kinda weird.
Bottle from Total Wine. Pours a toffee/orange body with a white rim for a head. Strong nose of caramel and wood. Flavors are similar: more caramel, toffee, wheat, bread, dark fruits, hint of piney metallic hops in the finish. The medium body and average carbonation. A decent beer, but this is not a fair representation of the Saison style.