Achel 8 Brune

This was the first beer of the week. We wanted to start things off with a bang, so one of our 4 trappists seemed like the way to go.

The Achel 8 Brune is one of 5 offerings from the abbey. The others are the Extra, 8 Blond, 5 Brune, and 5 Blond.

The beer pours to an attractive reddish-brown. It has a creamy head, 2 fingers thick, that dissipates slowly and leaves some lacing on the glass (for those of you who don't know, lacing is the foam that stays stuck to the side of the glass).

The aroma is sweet and fruity, with a cherry smell and malty hints.

The taste is once again of cherry and sweet malt. At first the high alcohol content comes through in the flavor, but this goes away quickly. The finish of the beer is bitter, but well balanced, and very warming. This would be a great beer in fall or winter especially.

The beer is light on the tongue, and the carbonation comes through strongly at first. It has a tingly feeling to it.

Because of the intensity of this beer, although it has an amazing flavor, this isn't one you'd want to sit down and drink a lot of. It's a beer to sit and enjoy, sipping as you go.

Like all trappist beers, this is brewed under the supervision of monks, with the proceeds going to support the monastery and charities. The history of this beer is quite rich, but one of the things I found most interesting was the fact that the monastery had a brewry until the First World War, when the German army drove the monks out and dismantled the brewery. In 1998 when the monks at the Achelse monastery decided to re-open the brewery, the monks at the Westmalle and Rochefort abbeys, which both brew their own trappist ales, helped to build the new brewery. Try finding cooperation like that in any other industry!

-Adam