A wide-open family of farmhouse ales that take the classic saison as a starting point and push well beyond it. Where a traditional saison leans on its yeast, a specialty saison adds something more — specialty malts, herbs and spices, fruit, a touch of wild Brettanomyces funk, or time in wood. The results range from straw-gold to dark brown and from delicately spiced to assertively tart, but they keep the saison’s defining dryness and high carbonation. Typically 5–9.3% ABV.
In the glass
Origin
The classic saison is a farmhouse ale of Wallonia, the French-speaking south of Belgium, and especially the province of Hainaut, where farmers brewed through the cooler months to lay in provision beer for the seasonal workers who came for the summer harvest. The modern benchmark is Saison Dupont, brewed on a farm in Tourpes that has operated since 1759 and became a farm-brewery in 1844. Exported to the United States and championed there beginning in the 1980s, it became the yardstick against which a generation of brewers measured the style.
Because the original farmhouse brewers worked with whatever the season provided — varying grains, and herbs or spices when hops were scarce — the saison tradition was loose and improvisational from the start. Modern brewers, especially in the United States, seized on that openness and treated the saison as a nearly blank canvas. The result was a wave of beers that kept the dry, spicy, highly carbonated saison frame while adding fruit, spice, darker malts, barrel-aging, and wild yeast. Boulevard’s Saison-Brett, first released in 2008 and built on the brewery’s Tank 7 farmhouse ale, is a representative example: a dry-hopped saison bottle-conditioned with Brettanomyces to develop earthy, funky, tropical-fruit complexity over time. Beers like these stretched the saison far enough from its classic shape that they came to be grouped as a distinct “specialty” family.
Notes
The line between a classic saison and a specialty saison is one of degree, not kind: a beer crosses over when its added fruit, spice, wood, or wild character becomes a defining feature rather than a grace note. Spicing is itself a throwback to farmhouse practice, but the modern category goes further, embracing tart Brett funk, barrel-aging, and fruit additions that the old farm-brewers would not recognize. Because the family is so broad, two specialty saisons can taste almost nothing alike — one bone-dry and golden with a whisper of pepper and Brett, another dark and rich with spice — which is precisely the point. For the classic, yeast-driven expression of the style, see the saison entry.
Defining examples
Boulevard Saison-Brett·Fantôme Saison·Stillwater Cellar Door·Brasserie de Blaugies Saison d’Épeautre