De Ranke XX Bitter

Aroma: 8 | Appearance: 6 | Mouthfeel: 8 | Flavor: 7 | Overall: 8

Opaque golden yellow with decent lasting white foam head. Aroma is hoppy, some floral. Taste is quite bitter, but nice. Aftertaste is long lasting (Utrecht 201306)

Aroma: 9 | Appearance: 9 | Mouthfeel: 9 | Flavor: 9 | Overall: 9

Poured really nice, straw yellow, bit of sediment... very little. Nice white head. Smelled, light fruity yeast, lots of hops. This surprised my. Eye Chart Brew says this beer is "apologetically rough around the edges, to set it apart from other Belgian Pale Ales". This is very accurate. Really really enjoyed. Like a quality west coast pale ale with a complex yeast note. Biscuityish malts. Apricots -- some fleshyness there I think. Nice!

Aroma: 7 | Appearance: 8 | Mouthfeel: 8 | Flavor: 8 | Overall: 8

Bottle, kindly shared by abemorsten. ABV is 6.2%. Golden colour, moderate white head. Lovely aroma of Belgian ale yeast and mild spices, a hint of peaches. The flavour is spicy and well balanced with a nice bitterness.

Aroma: 7 | Appearance: 7 | Mouthfeel: 7 | Flavor: 8 | Overall: 7

this was a pretty decent beer. went quite nice w/bread and mushroom barley soup @whole foods. hops and belgian yeastiness in about even amounts. the hops are mainly bitter, and the yeast a little fruity, spicy, and earthy. i disturbed the sediment a bit, but it was a newish beer (6/10) so it was all good.

Aroma: 7 | Appearance: 7 | Mouthfeel: 6 | Flavor: 6 | Overall: 6

This is supposedly the hoppiest Belgian beer....and I believe it. The website says the brewers were looking for Orval amped up to 11.......and I think they failed in that attempt. A cloudy gold colour with a generous white head. The aroma was citrusy hops, and yeast. The flavour was definitely bitter with grapefruit bitterness, but was not that well balanced by the malt or spices.

Aroma: 6 | Appearance: 7 | Mouthfeel: 7 | Flavor: 8 | Overall: 7

On draught: Pours a bright golden colour with a medium sized white head. Aroma has pleasent hoppy notes with some noticeable spice as well. Grapefruit, strong pine scent and floral as well. Taste is hopped, slightly tart with generous amounts of hops- which definately suprised me (in a good way). Slightly sour finish, but all around pretty nicebeer.

Aroma: 8 | Appearance: 8 | Mouthfeel: 3 | Flavor: 3 | Overall: 6

This newbie, tried at the Sharp Edge Creekhouse, had a firm rocky/fluffy white head that sat on top of a foggy golden to light amber colored liquid. The schnoz detected huge perfumy/flowery notes with noticeable yeast and citrus. XX Bitter's tastes, however, were hoppy and unimpressive. I found it to be very bitter (go figure), weak and dry. I was expecting it to be much sweeter, given the bold perfume aromas. The aftertaste was way over the top for me with too much hop bite. Not as bad as an IPA, but I thought it could have been better.

Aroma: 8 | Appearance: 6 | Mouthfeel: 7 | Flavor: 8 | Overall: 7

At the Pizzeria Paradiso Georgetown: Included this in my first sampler flight. Nice lacing, but lacking in aroma. Good hoppy bitters edge. Tasty and drinkable, but with perhaps a bit of dirty tongue. A smidge more caramel would balance it out.

Aroma: 7 | Appearance: 8 | Mouthfeel: 8 | Flavor: 8 | Overall: 8

I wasn't too impressed the first time I had this so I had to give it another try and this time I was more prepared for it. BBD Aug 2011??? Poured out a huge white cap that leaves excellent thick sticky lacing and has great retention. The beer looked lilke it might have a bit of haze in it but doesn't. Lots of effervecence and appears straw / gold in colour - that was until I dumped all the sludge from the bottle into my glass - now it is more like weak metamucil. The aroma is odd - musty fruit, strong dusty wheat, yeast, floral, a bit of spice and at has the smell of orange juice gone bad (thanks Aracauna, that is dead on). That smell does fade in strength during the warming process. Taste is suprisingly mellow when you get past the large ammount of hops with notes of apricots (weak) and pepper . However, even with the heavy bitter flavour it still seems sort of flat or watery....interesting. The mouthfeel is also very good with lots of soft carbonation and a notable malty middle with the hop hammer at the end giving a very long finish. I'm not sure why I enjoyed this much more this time around but I will get more for the odd casual drink and cellaring. A 3.9 on my own personal rate scale is very debatable.

Aroma: 7 | Appearance: 4 | Mouthfeel: 7 | Flavor: 3 | Overall: 3

Body of the beer appears to be beige slight orange, and is cloudier then London ( can’t believe how lame that sounds ). Very nice pillowy head that has some awesome retention, lacing was acceptable, beer looks good not great just good. Beer smells like nuts, sour stinky nuts sweaty if you would, and that’s pretty much all I can smell is sour nuts it’s not really offensive but it’s not making me want to drink this be either. The longer I sniff this beer the more I smell something that reminds me of hand cream and that’s just not a sent I want in my beer. Taste is strong sour and vile, it taste very soapy to me. This is just nasty did I get a bad bottle? A very yeasty back bone to the flavor buts its way to strong for my liking. Not enjoying this very strong flavored brew to aggressive with its vile sour soapiness. Nasty beer I got no enjoyment out of this, I’m finding myself having to force myself to finish it, horrid beer but there are worse out there.