Kasteel Kriek

Brewed by Brouwerij Van Honsebrouck
Style: Fruit Beer
Ingelmunster, Belgium

Serve in Flute

I am rating the Kasteel Rouge. The bottle I have didn’t say Kriek whatsoever. This beer is perfect. Everything about it is perfect. It has a dry Champagne finish like nothing else. The beer is quad-like complex with a rich cherry taste that has a disappearing sweetness.

Tasted on tap at Sourfest 2010. The cough drops mentioned below are Sucrets. This is the third brew that I’ve had that tastes wonderfully sharp of Sucrets, and each time I’ve tasted the brew, I thought it was the first one I tried. I didn’t take extensive notes because I thought I’d had it before. Oh well. I’ll have to rerate another time. Pink brown pour with big bubbly head. Righ cherry sweetness with sharpness. Sucrets. Not my fave of the day.

11.2oz bottle. The aroma is EXACT of those cherry cough drops you used to pop like candy when you were a kid - Luden’s maybe? The flavor isn’t quite so syrupy, and adds the other complexities of Belgian cherry brews that make it taste like nice spiced pie.

From a stubby bottle ("bottled on 080602" whatever that means... I don’t know how to decipher the code, but I can assume it was brewed in 2008 at the earliest, so the bottle is at least 2 years old). So I poured this one really aggressively and still got hardly any head. Regardless it has a beautiful dark red body with a very small pink head. The aroma is very reminiscent of NG Belgian Red -- all fresh cherries (sweet, not tart). The flavor is no different. As with NGBR, beer this fruity are reminiscent of artificial fruit flavoring and taste similar to a juice box. BUT, it is indeed a very refreshing cherry flavor, which is impressive if it was achieved through a legitimate non-additive brewing process. The alcohol is nowhere to be found. Medium bodied with medium to soft carbonation. Overall: this is a beautiful dessert beer. However, I would never have more than .5 to 1 bottle in a sitting. I think this is just as good, if not better, than NGBR.

Bottle: Beige to rose quick disappearing foamy head. Color is deep dark red to deep dark amber brown, almost black. Smell is dominated by cherry. Pretty light sweet and sour taste, taste some cherry, but no alcohol due to it’s pretty high (8%) percentage. Well balanced with carbonation and fruity ingredient(s)

Not a great beer at all, not terrible, I wouldnt buy it again. I was expecting substantially more.

Dark brown with a red note. Pink head, mostly lasting. Strong cherry aroma, almond too. Notes of red-wine. Flavor is sweet and fruity, lots of cherries, faint acid too. A bit astringent.

cherry aroma, mandel aroma,red with brown, clear, cherry color head,medium sweetness, lightly bitter, creamy, soft carbonation, very nice beer.