Leffe Blonde

Perspicacious.  That’s an interesting word.  I used to know what it means, I think.  I should look it up before it drives me crazy all day.  Un momento…  Ah, there we are!  Perspicacious: having keen mental perception and understanding; discerning.  Okay, I’m back in the knowing-what-perspicacious-means game!  Hold on, what’s this?  Often confused with perspicuous.  Hmm…  Perspicuous: clearly expressed or presented; lucid.  I can see how those are similar.  Most perspicacious people are likely also perspicuous.  Of course the former is more difficult than the latter.  Someone who is perspicuous could be clearly expressing drivel.  Or is it?  Someone with a connection to the autistic spectrum would probably disagree.  And I have witnessed very thoughtful people with keen insights get crushed in debate by deft rhetoric.  I guess we should strive for them together but be content with either and hopefully never fall short of both.

I should just let my musings sink in and then apply them to my reviewing and writing styles but I like to use them directly in a kind of zymurgic personification.  How does Leffe’s Blonde exhibit keen mental perception and how does it lucidly express it?  Concretely it doesn’t.  It’s water and sugar and alcohol after all.  But I can imagine.  If a baby can recognize faces on inanimate objects, I should be able to assess the cognitive abilities of a drink!  If it doesn’t work, no harm done.  If it does, I can call a psychiatrist.  Either way I get a beer.  Here is Leffe Blonde.

Well the color is clearly expressed!

That aroma does not beat around the bush.  It pops up right away saying “I’m Belgian and you love me!”  Sure there’s complexity in the nose between mild notes of astringency and banana, but they all point with one hand.  The flavor speaks of the joys of non-fruit Belgian beers.  It briefly mentions alcohol bite, yeast funk and horse blanket but never delves into any on them.  It even gives a small hint of that quintessential dry mouthfeel in the aftertaste.  Definitely perspicuous.  Short winded and prosaic.

As for its perspicacity, I’m drawing a blank.  It could have just hobbled the flavors together and chanced upon a good combination or it could have very particularly chosen every ingredient so as to exemplify the beer making tradition to which each is wed.  If I had to choose one I’d go with the latter simply because it’s more optimistic and optimism always makes life happier.  But I can’t seem to get inside the head of Leffe Blonde.  I guess my psychiatrist will have to spend today alone, sitting on the couch perspicaciously thinking about other people’s problems.