I have always found Duvel to be a fascinating beer. I find it rather unique among Belgian strong ales. Its light body, delicate fruitiness and soft palate are really quite special. I find in comparison to other Belgian beer, the spicing is toned down a bit, allowing some other aspects of the beer to shine through.

So you can imagine my intrigue when I found a bottle of Duvel Tripel Hop on a store shelf. The label claims it to be a more assertively hopped version of Duvel, including a regime of dry hopping. The bitter and flavour hops are Saaz and Styrian golding, which are pretty routine for Belgian beer an apparently their regular hop additions. It was their choice of dry hop that arched my eyebrow – Mosaic, the new hybrid from the makers of Simcoe. Mosaic apparently displays very American citrus characters (I haven’t brewed with it yet, so am only going on a smattering of samplings).

My instinct was that this beer was either going to be fantastic or a complete train wreck. The issue is that I, personally, find the mixing of sharp American hop flavours with Belgian yeast spiciness to be off-putting most of the time. I think the flavours clash and fight each other too much. But given how much I enjoy Duvel, it seemed worth a try.

It looks exactly like Duvel, pouring pale yellow, almost straw in colour. It builds a huge white head with significant lacing and which finds a way to last all the way through the sipping. It is very effervescent with active, extensive bubbles. The aroma is light and  grainy. I detect a soft pilsner malt accented by subtle pepper and a noticeable fresh, green fruity hop aroma. There is also some clovey earthiness in the background.

In the sip I get a soft silky malt at first accompanied by a light pear fruitiness. The middle presents a delicate hop freshness, offering a fruity, earthy hop character.It is not so much a citrus flavour as more grassy and lemony. The Belgian spiciness starts to makes itself known half way in with a light pepper and finding a way to accent the earthiness. I sense touches of clove as well. The linger starts with some hop character but is quickly owned by the Belgian spiciness.It offers a pleasant, fresh, peppery linger well past the end of the sip.

This is no train wreck. Quite the opposite. For once I really like how the hops and Belgian spicing come together. The Mosaic addition seem to make the beer fresher and greener. It seems to add a layer of fruitiness to the beer, rather than a harsh hop citrus-y note. The key may be that they didn’t spike the IBUs too much (if at all, the bitter impression remains rather balanced). Instead they went for accenting the classic Duvel flavour with a bit of hop flavour and aroma – adding another dimension, so to speak.

The beer holds all of the remarkable drinkability of Duvel (which makes it such a dangerous beer) but adds a little extra something. An admirable and well-executed experiment.