"Let there be...Saisons!"
New York this time of year has somewhat dismal weather. The grey lurks through most days, clouds shunt the suns paltry attempts at relaying any semblance of warmth, and night settles early, often accompanied by biting winds and rain. Times like these call for beers that harken to summer - its long, sunlit days, warm, breeze-filled nights, and the many wonderful social gathering outdoors that give it a pleasantly active sense of relaxation.
Belgian farm-workers in the French speaking part of the country inaugurated the overarching style of the Saison. They brewed during the cooler months of the winter, then stored the ale in barrels in farmhouses or barns to ferment until the warmer summer months. At that point, they enjoyed the fruits of their labor.
The grand-daddy of the style is Saison Dupont Vielle Provision, still brewed out of Brasserie Dupont in Belgium. After crafting the initial brew, the beer is placed in thick-walled green glass bottles for secondary fermentation, where the brewer's yeast digests the remaining brewing matter left in the corked bottle. This results in an unfiltered beer with strong natural carbonation.
It's important to note at this point that Saison still lacks a particular specificity. Any number of beers brewed in some level of concordance with the tradition of brewing Saisons in Belgium can claim to be Saisons, but their character, flavor, and ABV can vary appreciably. Thus, it's perhaps more helpful to think of a Saison as a larger umbrella for a series of smaller subsets of beers (much like how you'd hear the term Sour used in beer naming). The shared characteristics tend to be bottle-conditioning / secondary fermentation, smells/tastes of yeast, straw, barnyard, spices, and faint citrus, a light mouthfeel, and a dry finish.
A few Saturdays ago, two beer-loving friends visited me in New York, trekking in from rural Massachusetts and Washington DC, respectively, to enjoy a weekend of ale-appreciation. My girlfriend joined as well. The four of us (who had been on a trivia team in college at the local pub) gathered round and tasted our way through four Saisons (pictured above, left to right):
- Anchorage Brewing Company Love Buzz Saison ($15.25 for 25 oz at New Beer, NY, NY) - Anchorage, AK
- Goose Island Sofie ($12 for a 4-pack of 12 oz bottles at New Beer, NY, NY) - Chicago, IL
- Saison Dupont Vielle Provision ($11 for 25 oz at Whole Foods, NY, NY) - Tourpes, Belgium
- Brooklyn Brewery Sorachi Ace ($11 for 25 oz at Whole Foods, NY, NY) - Brooklyn, NY
