A few local breweries have saison offerings and both of them miss the mark… by quite a lot, IMO. I asked the assistant brewer of one what yeast they were using and he mentioned a mix of saison and wit yeasts. That might explain the overriding banana I get out of theirs which I consider a fault in a saison. The other brewery has one that is not sharp/dry at all - just a flabby and sweet mess in which the dry hopping does nothing to cover the mistakes.
Is this the norm or am I just having bad luck with local saisons?
I often find Saisons disappointing - both craft-brewed and home-brewed. That said, there are commercial and home-brewed examples that are sublime - I’m not a Saison hater. I think its a style where it’s easy for a brewer to get lax or complacent. I think that’s true of some other “rustic” styles, too. Just because a beer style can be fermented at a higher temperature and can be expected to have some funky or rustic character doesn’t give the brewer a pass on using good fermentation practices or showing appropriate restraint with ingredients.
One of my biggest gripes about a lot of saisons and what not is that banana character that seems to happen with a hot ferment with some of the alternative strains like French Saison or Farmhouse.
Is it that’s pro’s over pitch, or possibly have issues with properly raising fermentation temps? My brews end up fairly dry with a nice pepper note, but I rapidly crank the temp once a krausen forms. I’ve also created a blend from commercial brews/strains I enjoy; standard, Dupont, ommegang, and wlp566.