Top Tastings 2008. A shorter version appeared on facebook January 2009.
Beer sellers: Beermania
ABV: 5.5%
Origin: Èthe, Luxembourg, Wallonie
Website: http://www.sainte-helene.be/
Sainte Hélène La Djean d'Mady
Founded in 1999 by home brewer Eddy Pourtois, who named it after a street he walked down when working as a postman, Ste-Hélène, originally in Virton, has contributed to the emerging excitement of the microbrewing scene in Wallonia, and is one of several welcome new breweries in the fascinating southern Belgian region of the the Gaume. Amber ale Djean d’Mady was conceived as a regional thirst quencher in an old fashioned style, though since sampling this bottle, which I found at the famous Brussels specialist beer shop Beer Mania, it appears to have been withdrawn from the regular range — though the Gaumais character Djean on the label also crops up on a the brewery’s triple.
Reddish amber with a creamy yellow head, the beer has a fruity, creamy and toasty gooseberry fool aroma, a clean cherry apple palate with a rustic acid touch and drying spicy hops over cream. There are more hops in a pleasant soft and sappy finish with a touch of burnt rubber spice. If it has been withdrawn, more’s the pity, as it’s both a fine craft brew and a sociable, sessionable ale which shows the link both with the more northerly Spéciale style of amber ale and the bière de garde tradition over the French border to the south.
Read more about this beer at ratebeer.com: http://www.ratebeer.com/beer/sainte-helene-djean-dmady-ambree/38500/
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