Ardwen Hop's Cure - This Drinking Life

Ardwen Hop’s Cure

www.ardwen.fr/en/

Brewed by Brasserie Ardwen
Style: Tripel
Launois-sur-Vence, France

The Ardennes in northeastern France, close to the Belgian and Luxembourg border, is a sparsely populated region mostly covered with dense forest, small mountains and not much else.

Mad as it is, this area at the beginning of the 20th Century, was France’s leading region for brewing beers with no fewer than 230 breweries, mostly small enterprises. It might be due to the lovely fresh waters and rivers emanating down from the hills and valleys in the area.

But the two World War’s put a sharp stop to a lot of this and brewing was beginning to look a thing of the past here. That was until, in 2003, some locals came together to start up some brewing in the area after all those barren years. That brewery was called Ardwen, using the local knowledge of the past in their pursuit of rekindling the traditions of yesteryear. Production followed shortly after, and with it some immediate success winning prestigious beer awards in France (Golden medalist at 2007 Concours Général Agricole).

In tribute to the locale and its legends, the logo of the Brewery represents Arduinna, the protective Celtic goddess of the dark and uninhabited Ardennes forests, riding a wild boar, the emblem of the region, and an animal that is still hunted to this day in the locale.

All of Ardwen’s hops, yeast and malt are grown locally, and these beer ingredients are combined with fresh, pure countryside water to produce their award winning brews.

This is my second tryout with a beer from Ardwen, as I had a bottle of their Ardwen Blonde a while back which I thought was a nice beer overall, smooth, went down well, got the malts, some fruits and the caramel, and overall found it a pleasant brew.

Review: 0,33l brown bottle of Ardwen Hop’s Cure: 8.0% vol.

Hop’s Cure was brewed to celebrate the 1000th brew of the Ardwen brewery, a landmark moment that the brewery should be well proud of. Called Hop’s Cure as the beverage gave strength and courage to those who drank them, a remedy to cowardice, needed in the dark forests of the Ardennes, what with all those bloody crazy wild boars running around the place!

This beer by Arden, was a winner for France in the World Beer Awards, winning a gold medal in best French beer in the World Beer Awards golden ale category.

Massive, massive white frothy head on the pour. Really big, a lot of carbonation, all alive and fizzing away. Head is far too big.

Otherwise the colour is amber. Head maintains very well, of course, with a lot of lacing.

Eventually settles down, looks much better once calmness kicks in.

Second bottle, get a very white frothy head, and more cloudy in appearance, dark golden.

Is a good-looking beer for sure in that its head maintains, good bit of lacing and deep in colour.

Smells good, very fruity, very hoppy, strong yeasty smell on the nose, all nice

On the taste I found it very hoppy, a very deep tasting hoppy beer that was very strong on the stomach. Too bitter, and too spicy. Get the roasted malts and the caramel, but the hops kill the other flavours in this beer.

Bit too intense in the taste for little old me, not pleasurable at all, very difficult to drink.
Also gave me a slight head the next day!