Les Vergers Lafrance Domaine Lafrance

Huge apple aroma, like walking into an apple storage shed. Liquid gold in color, no carbonation, no head. The flavor! Oh my, the flavor. Heavy apple flavor with a beautiful mouth puckering bite. I never knew ice ciders existed 6 months ago, and now the two I’ve had have literally been some of the best tasting beverages of any kind I’ve ever had. If I had to knock this for anything at all, I’d say the back end is just the smallest touch cloying, but I tipped the empty bottle upside down over my tongue to catch the last drop. Excellent stuff.

Brown sugar, cinnamon and apple sauce in the leafy aroma along with a hint of alcohol. Clear, deep golden in colour with a viscous, thick appearance and nice legs on the glass. Sweetness up front with some appleskin tartness in the finish. Alcohol is quite apparent but never distracting and suffuses its way throughout the flavour. Although it almost seems to sweet at first, the interplay between the sweetness and the tartness is quite elegant. Medium body is velvety smooth in texture and sticky on the lips. Pleasantly warming and very enjoyable! Ice cider glass. Cellar temperature. Bottle (50ml, SAQ at Jean Talon Market, Aug-06).

0.2L bottle. Many thanks Natalie and Roei, for bringing this treasure from Quebec. beautiful gold yellow colour, subdued appley aroma, complex flavours of fresh, baked and cooked apples. Balanced perfectly between rich but not cloying sweetness and piercing fresh acidity.This is a revelation and like nothing else i have ever tasted. For a long time after the bottle was finished i was sitting around it, trying to "milk" the glass for some more of this elixir. An excellent desert drink, on par with some of the best desert wines i have tasted over the years.

50 ml bottle (from the SAQ at Marche Jean Talon, Montreal) served out of the fridge in a Face Cachee la Pomme glass. Faint legs die like speedy icicles above the clear, whisky-gold thick body....potent, sharp sugared apples with the faintest tartness underlying and whispers of alcohol in the intoxicating nose....very sweet and smooth on the tongue, no alcoholic harshness, thick and lightly syrupy, oaky with hints of sour cherry and almond, quite complex and supremely elegant....a light acidic tartness and even somehow crispness -- if that can be possible in such a liqueurish treat -- help to elevate this near the top of the hieararchy of ice ciders. Wonderful.

Deep gold. Aroma is red apples, sugar, alcohol, cinnamon. Taste is lightly tart but at the same time sweet, nice smooth apple taste, mild, not overly sweet. I could have drank the whole bottle.