Review Date 2/22/2012
Try?
Re-buy?
What’s my favorite Canadian brewery? It has to be Unibroue. I’ve been drinking their beers since they first started brewing them way back in 1991. Can it really be 21 years ago? How times does fly when you’re drinking beer. Anyway, the company was founded in Quebec by two local beer fanatics, Andre Dion and Serge Racine. Serge’s name seems now to be almost a bit of foreshadowing; “racine” is French for “root”, and no craft brewery is more firmly rooted in Canada than Unibroue.
Unibroue has a habit of releasing a commemorative brew each year to celebrate their history. Tonight the one I’m drinking is Unibroue 16. Since I’ve been aging this beer for about five years now (it was released ion 2007), you might not be able to get your hands on a bottle. Still, Unibroue often releases similar beers (this is a Belgian style Abbey Tripel, and their regularly available “La Fin du Monde” is in the same vein). The way Unibroue 16 holds up over time can therefore give you an idea how other such beers they make will age as well.
I remove the cage from the cork on my 750 ML bottle and then pry off off the mushroom shaped cork. There’s a loud “pop!” as I finally get the bottle open, and tendrils of vapor slowly waft their way out of the bottle. I decant some of the beer into a bulb-shaped, stemmed Belgian beer glass and savor the aroma.
Unibroue 16 pours to a murky yellow orange color with a very thick head of creamy foam and a spicy nose packed with dark cherry fruit notes. Taking a sip, I get some distinct chewy malt notes along with crackery notes, lots of spice and subtle tart undertones of soft fruit. There are some earthy, funky yeast notes going on adding hints of cotton candy as well. In the finish, the spice dries somewhat and the alcohol (10% alcohol by volume here) even more.
This is an exceptional beer that warms the bones on a cold February night, some 5 years after it was bottled. Unibroue 16, like most of the Unibroue line, is bottle conditioned. It was the second to last beer in the Unibroue “numbered” series; Unibroue 17 obviously being the last. Indeed, I even wonder if I should have drunk this, the last bottle I had of Unibroue 16. A bottle of Unibroue 17 went for $127 at a Montreal auction in 2010. Once can only wonder what the 16 might have fetched.
And remember, try a new beer today, and drink outside the box.
*Pricing data accurate at time of review or latest update. For reference only, based on actual price paid by reviewer.
(B)=Bottled
(D)=Draft
