Foamer’s Folly – Melosia 2018 Foeder-Aged Brown Ale

Foamer’s Folly – Melosia 2018 Foeder-Aged Brown Ale Review

The first thing you need to determine when trying to evaluate this beer is: what is it? Foamers’ Folly doesn’t reveal that on the label, subtitling Melosia as a “Limited Edition Foeder Aged”…beer. At least, you infer that it’s beer; a specific style is not stated in the descriptor, only a process. Kind of like having an adjective but no noun (legal designation on the label: ‘Extra Strong Beer’). That’s a clue that perhaps the brewers felt their creation was too interesting to pigeonhole.

Anyway, eventually you deduce that it’s a Belgian-style brown ale. Similar to an Oud Bruin, but not as agressively sour. A trifle tart with a hint of fruit, but not a “sour beer” in the normal sense. It’s funky, but not like a farmhouse ale. Chocolaty, but not like any of the English dark styles. It is what it is: a nice (and presumably first) iteration of a wood-aged brown ale from the folks at Foamers’.

As you might gather from that précis, Melosia presented an interesting melange of flavours and aromas. On the nose, there was licorice, black cake, acetic acid, chocolate and peppery alcohol thanks to the almost 10% ABV.

Flavours included caramel and chocolate (one of us was kind of reminded of a Crispy Crunch bar). On the palate, there was toastiness, plus a slight silky sourness that one might associate with a lactose addition (although there was none).

This 2018 beer (launched March 2019) was fairly rounded when opened, and with further aging it might have become more complex. Some might say its variety of unrelated notes makes it less than a world-class Belgian brown, and that’s certainly fair. This is the kind of beer that some will love and some will dislike. But if this year-old bottle could somehow appear on the menu at a local beer bistro, it might be the most noteworthy brew of the night for many beer geeks. Good on Foamers’ Folly for aiming high with their aging program.