Chapeau Kriek

2000 Vintage.    Deep whisky color with red edges and a thick, white halo. Cherry aroma has an odd cereal background & light vitamin undertones. Sugary sweet to start, but the cherries beneath quickly show their tartness. A little sticky in the mouth. You must be in the mood for a sweet affront before you dive into this one, but I certainly was after sampling a variety of gueueze.

<font size=-4>Sampled at Delilah’s <a href=http://www.ratebeer.com/events-detail.asp?eventID=4201>2nd Annual Lambic Beer Festival.</font>

(Bottle) Pours a lightly cloudy red body with a spare white head. Aroma of candish cherry. Flavor of lightly cherry (more sugary than sour).

A pretty winy fruitbeer - amazing done with only 3,5% alcohol! The smell is obviously with a lot of cherrys, but it sometimes can seem a little artificial - it reminds me a lot like cheap cherry wine with a lot of additives. The taste is at first kind of sour, but then it becomes sweeter, just like real cherries. It has a medium body, and it is really great for the low alcohol percentage. The beer can seem a little too sugary, but it doesn’t matter too me - i think it gives a good balance with the sourness. The beer is obviously refreshing allthough it is dry, and it might be unfiltrered. Anyway, there’s something in the bottom of the glass that might be yeast remnants.

Oh, this is nice. Has some Christmas spices throughout, perhaps nutmeg. Probably the best of the chapeau bunch I’ve had, thought they aren’t all that wonderful.

Pours a hazy cherry, little head and nice 1/8th-inch retention to the bottom of the glass. Sour cherry Jolly Rancher candy to the nose, with somewhat of a medicinal Robitussin hue. I pick up very sour unripened cherries, but a weird dirt flavor, indigenous of garden greens. This is a bit unusual and not welcomed for the style. The traditional Chapeau soda finish/mouthfeel, but with more of a "plastic" taste, lends an over-processed note to the brew. Not the best Kriek lambic out there, surely.

Pours a hazy solid red with a thin head. Sweet, dark cherry aroma. Very sweet, dark cherry flavor, with a bit of acidity in the finish. Has some lingering mustiness. Not complex at all and the cherries are obviously not tart or shearbeek but the flavor is still one of quality. Comparing this to other Lambics is kind of ridiculas. Would be good over ice.

By no means a great kriek, but overall, not bad. Very sweet. Nice head. I found the cherries to be a bit too much and bordering on a little fake tasting. No proper sourness/tartnees to balance out the sweetness.

Bottled:
Intensive almond note, sweetish cherry notes. Sweet and sour flavor. Cherry juice feeling, light almond note. Sourly and astringent finish. Too artificial.