Gavroche French Red Ale

Look at the little fella. Just look at him. You'd be mad not to have a soft spot for old Gav looking at his mugshot.

Then you meet Gav in person and something's amiss and awry. What have those frenchies done with Gav?

Whatever they've done it's turned an erstwhile, earnest young beret wearer into something oddly winelike and really not too pleasant. This is probably a bit to do with a lack of familiarity with the style, but I found the other effort tried recently a lot better than this one. I feel like this could have been improved with a greater malt / sweetness profile. 4.5

Saint Sylvestre 3 Monts Biere de Flandre

A big french bottle, with a cork held down with a massive metal staple. Pretty cool.

I was expecting something kind of dark given the alc content at 8.5% but this pours light and translucent like wine. A light head stretches across the slight malt aroma. The alcohol is really well disguised under fruit, spice, wine notes. Very different.

I've not really drank anything like this before and I feel the only reason this is only getting 7.5 is because I'm not familiar with this style at all. But there it is, until there's more time to investigate. 7.5