Beer – #488 – Moa – Blanc Evolution

This one: A First, First Things, First things First, and a Finish.

Moa Blanc Evolution is bottle fermented in the Belgian-style with a small amount of coriander added during its extended maturation time giving it a unique spiciness. Described as a rich, mouth-filling beer, it’s really a true wheat lover’s beer and a staple of the Moa Reserve range.

To round out the Moa Blanc trilogy I’ve managed of course to get them in the wrong order and so I finish with the Evolution.

Brewed by Moa Brewing Company this is in the style that is a Belgian White (Witbier) and they are in Blenheim, New Zealand.

A small 330ml bottle, cork and cage, 6.2% ABV, 186 calories, this is 1.83 standard drink units.

Sunday, sunday……

Moa Blanc Evolution has a slight fruity aroma and a crisp, refreshing finish.

Stone fruit and hazelnut flavours compliment the distinctive dominant spicy and phenolic characters.

With a subtle hop aroma and bitterness, Moa Blanc Evolution is well paired with lightly aged cheeses, smoked and savoury meals, or on its own for a satisfying pint.

Moa Blanc Evolution is best served at approximately 4˚C in a pilsner glass.

Moa are undergoing some changes, all in progress, but they appear to be making a move to standardised 500ml bottles, re-branding, and shedding some of the range, although they might deny it. They’ve also been contract brewing for the last year, and these changes might be the continuance of that and reducing some costs, but here I just speculate. Love the cork and cage, it adds a little to the excitement, and no doubt the costs.

Not my best work.

Spend 5 minutes cleaning up beer after the cork spectacularly popped and beer fizzed all over the macbook, the table, floor and the cork took out the cat.

I’ve never worn a beer in such a spectacular way before. Not a good thing. My own fault for peeling the cage and then thinking I could gently roll the bottle to move the sediment.

The aroma though is really nice, sweet fruity and sugary. Its lively, very lively, I have a whole glass of excitable foam to deal with, and I really tried to be pour gentle.

Sometimes you end up feeling like a klutz.

This is a much ‘softer’ drink than the standard blanc, and drinks more like a Wheat beer might.

The hops and the associated roughness are not present that I could detect. Now the foam subsides this is a pleasing cloudy golden yellow, and the carbonation bubbles are pretty in the glass.

But as to the overall taste experience and how this sits int he scheme of things. This different to the standard ‘Blanc’ it is softer, but it is also more intense in the middle.

The aroma is stronger (MrsPdubyah just noticed the rather pungent room), and there is a lingering to the finish that is more to dry than not. The wine elements are highlights and can be picked.

The pdubyah-o-meter rates this as 7 a of its things from the thing. I wanted it to be better, I couldn’t have wished for more exciting though. The double dip review

Am I enjoying it? Not in the way that I expected to, or might have expected to.
Would I have another? No.
Would I share with a friend on a porch and set the world to rights? No. There isn’t anything special or defining in this that would make it a conversation piece, or move a conversation along.

Music to drink by for this in an evolution of the band Status Quo, legends, their Quo Live album is one of the best live albums ever, in my opinion. So I was overcome with unbounded joy when I discovered they had a new album – The acoustic Status Quo 2014 album – Aquostic (Stripped Bare). This is the track “And it’s better now”

One of those occasions where the music was better than the beer, and that doesn’t happen all that often.

BELGIAN WHITE & WITBIER

Belgian style wheat beers are very pale, opaque, with the crisp character of wheat, plus the citric refreshment of orange peel and coriander. Ingredients sometimes also include oats for smoothness, and other spices such as grains of paradise. Serve with light cheeses or mussels.