Founders Cerise

Brewed by Founders Brewing Company
Style: Fruit Beer
Grand Rapids, Michigan USA

Serve in Flute

Founders. YOU LURE ME IN WITH YOUR SWEET SWEET FRUITY BEERS. I will never learn. Your fruit beer will drive me to wine coolers and girly martinis. I’m comfortable with that, but are you? I’ve never seen a hot pink beer before. But I’ve also never inhaled cherry fumes. I didn’t know cherries emit fumes, honestly. Cherry pie with cinnamon fumes, precisely. The only thing that comes close is Belgian Red, but the fumes are more fumey here. Dances like a cherry pie too--some perverse ethereal elven cherry pie, woven from moonbeams and gossamer. Lower carbonation, but it still dances so, there must be a dash of fairy dust. My tastebuds disagree. Far too much lively acidity for moonbeams and gossamer doesn’t finish nearly so cleanly. Again with that cinnamon, but maybe it’s nutmeg. Just a hint, a hint mind you, of that acrid vomit sort of acidity in the start, but in a good way. Sweet up the middle. Long tart finish. I want to replace my blood with this beer and live forever in a magical forest under the ocean. Man up and give this beer the rating it deserves!

12oz bottle. Pours glowing hazy reddish orange with a small head that quickly goes to a thin collar.

The aroma is some bready malts, a little spice and slightly tart sweet pie cherries.

The flavor is sweet pie cherries with a little tartness and a little wood. The mouthfeel is medium to full bodied with low carbonation.

Overall, it’s all about the sweet cherries. Too sweet and one-dimensional for me. A poor man’s New Glarus Belgian Red.

Nice sour cherry flavors. This does not lead to cloying, or single note flavors in the mouth. Excellent complexity and a fuller body than I expected. Long, long finish.

Poured from a bottle into a tulip glass. Appearance is copper with a slightly pink hue. Head is thick and bubbly white with a pinkish tinge to it. Aroma is grainy and cloyingly sweet. Almost synthetic. I do get a cherry presence, but it isn’t really a cherry smell. It’s like candy with a cherry flavor. The cherry comes through in a dry, almost tart flavor that is more reminiscent of pie crust that has sat under cherry pie filling. Mouthfeel is a little dry with a medium body. Not much in the way of carbonation. Wow, I really didn’t expect this beer to be so...meh. Even a great brewery is bound to put out a sub-par product every once in a while.

(Bottle) Pours hazy reddish pink with a white to pale pink head. The aroma is of chemical-smelling cherries, dry malt and earth. The flavour is light sweet to dry, tiny bitter and light to medium acidic with notes of sour cherries alongside hints of hops and malt. The mouthfeel is tart and light sticky (but dry). Lemon acid aftertaste. Near medium bodied.

Bottle - has a light cloudy orange color to it. Has a sweet cherry taste (big shock there) to it with a medium body and a smooth finish. Decent fruit beer.

Pinkish/copper, minimal head. Aroma has muted tart cherry, slight mineral character. Flavor much the same, little too sweet in the finish. Palate thins at times. Probably a nice P.D. Decent at best.

Aroma of funk, cherry and bread. Pours peachy with an ordinary fluffy head. Tastes tart of cherry, bread, and slight floral. Tasty and not too fake tasting.

This was a nice change of pace especially around the holidays. It wasn’t as flavorful as a Belgian cherry lambic however it was much better than Sam Adam’s Cherry Wheat. This beer is not a session beer, rather a dessert beer, and would pair exquisitely with some Godiva chocolates.