Kasteel Kriek

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

Serve in Flute

A: Very sexy brew. Pours a dark reddish purple, like a fine wine. The head is nice and thick at the edge of the glass, and is a nice foamy white tinged with purple. S: Big Cherry aroma all over the nose, with a nice candy like sweetness. T: MMM, very tasty, Not as sweet as most of the cherry beers I’ve had, and there is a distinct tartness from the fruit which makes this one a real winner. M: Light and sparkling in body. Very refreshing.

Bottle from Sam’s, Durham, shared with family. Good thing it was shared, because I’m not sure I could finish a big bottle of kriek quite this sweet and (relatively) one-dimensional. The pour is nice, a dusky brown with a pinkish tint to it and a crisp carbonation cap. A bit of age seems not to have done this one too many favors, as the cough syrup flavors have come to dominate. Slightly syrupy, with just a hint of cherry pit and not much of a sense of the underlying ale’s character. Average.

Pours a dark brown with reddish edges Pinkish off white head. Big tart cherry aroma. Flavor is sweet then tart cherry with a lightly bitter finish.

330 ml Bottle white the name kasteel rouge a dark red beer smell cherry and very sweet taste cherry and a lot of sweetness and little bite of alcohol

Really nice aroma and color, let down by the head formation. The initial flavor is amazing; real cherries, not in any way artificial. Earthy and bitter. The second wave is very, very sweet, almost cloying. Definitely a small-quantity (by which I mean taster sized) sort of beer.

33cl bottle, different from the one pictured (brown, stumpier). Pours a dark, deep ruby red with a small pink head that disappears very quickly. Minimal lacing. Aroma of red cherries, toasted malt and even a hint of cinnamon. Medium-bodied "dark" ale with active carbonation - thick, full mouth feel. A formidable example of Belgian fruit beers, this one has a deep, sweet-and-sour dark cherry flavour - but also tastes like real beer! Nothing artificial about the fruit flavour at all. Impressively malty bitterness counters the initial fruity sweetness very quickly, and leads to a sweet-and-sour finish. Lingering, slightly sour after taste. Very refreshing, complex, gratifying fruit beer that is so much better than the previous "extreme kriek" Belgian ales I had before. Positive proof that is can be done! Sessionable, too!

Bottle. Poured a deep red with with a reddish brown head that laces nicely. Aroma was full of cherries both sweet and tart. The flavor carries the same qualities as the cherries are well balanced between sweetness and tartness.

At an albert heijn XL in Zaandam, bottle 330ml my bottle says "kasteel rouge" dark red, pink fizzy no lasting head, fizzy taste with lots of cherryfruits and soure citrus, almost no bitter and grain, a bit like a hi-alcohol fruitbeer, not my kind. With bad acid sweetners.