Brasserie Cantillon - Rosé de Gambrinus

Purchased From: Bierkraft 
Serving Type: 12 oz. bottle, corked and capped, poured into a plastic cup

Through a multiyear process of fermentation and blending Cantillon produces fruit beers that boast massive fruit favors, but keep a definitive dry edge. As a result, this Framboise stands out from the pack of other raspberry or fruit beers. The body is a hazy brownish pink with a mild copper glow. The head is a thick light pink foam, creamy and dense. The head retention is excellent in the plastic cup and leaves tons of lace.

The nose is strong and bitingly tart. The sweet and fruity nose seems to burst with raspberries and offers up a sublime cellary funk. The beer is cheek-pinching and puckers up the face immediately on the first sip. The beer is sweet with huge fruit, but not overly toothsome. The sour Lambic base provides combination of earthiness and light malt, but the grain seems completely overpowered. The textured carbonation is bristling and bright with a Champagne-like consistency.

The beer is delicious and sweet. It is a fruit beer on the world class level. The finish is just as tart as the foretaste and the sweet fruitiness lingers with a hint of sugar.

Final Verdict: A

Brasserie Cantillon - St. Lamvinus

Brewed in: Brussels, Belgium
Serving Type: 750 mL bottle, poured into a snifter

Saint Lamvinus is a classic Gueuze, a blend of young and old Lambics, aged with French wine grapes, from the Bordeaux wine region in the cask. The beer pours a pinkish maroon body with darkish brown undertones. The thin white foam of the beer has a minor pink hue. The foam is wispy and leaves elegant, yet thin, traces of lace on the glass and clings slightly to the surface of the beer. The nose is very tart and sour with a definite cellary funk. Rich juicy red grapes enhance the tart character and offer a refined sweetness. The nose also carries a slight medicinal aroma, a bit like a medicated cough drop.

Like most excellent Lambics St. Lamvinus is highly carbonated with dancing Champagne-like bubbles. Lambic beers are the true "Champagne of Beers," Miller High Life, on the other hand, is a true joke. The grapes are fresh and fruity and give both hints of fruit and lend a remarkable meatiness to the beer. Hints of raspberry and other tart fruit show as well. The aged, cellary funk is pervasive, at once adding to the tart mouthfeel and lending an aged dustiness. The finish is tight and tart. The light medicinal edge returns, but is not off-putting. As the beer fades, a dry and vaguely sugary feeling remains.

This beer is a one of a kind and a true treat. Cantillon is a world renowned brewer and at the absolute height of the, very few remaining, Lambic producers. If you can find this beer, get it! While most Lambics are suitable for extended cellaring, I would not recommend cellaring this beer for any significant length of time. The delicate grape infusion is sure to lose its potency and its true contribution if left in the cellar for too long. If you find this, not only should you get it(!), you should enjoy it soon!

Final Verdict: A

Brouwerij Lindemans - Cassis

Purchased From: Beltway Fine Wine
Serving Type: 750 mL corked, capped, and foiled bottle, poured into a fluted glass

This black currant-flavored beer is another fruit-infused Lambic from Brouwerij Lindemans of Belgium. The beer pours a rich purply-maroon, very reminiscent of a red wine. The deep beet-like color is eye-catching and extremely consistent. The frothy head is pink and massive in size. The beer retains its head for sometime and the wispy lacing is elegant.

There's a definite cellary must to the nose with a prevalent dryness. The sweet fruitiness comes through extremely strong on the nose. A clear indication of what's to come. The black currants are extremely prominent and tasteful. The carbonation is way on the high-end, almost champagne like in texture. The sweetness is very strong, but not cloying. The finish is sweet, with a tart edge and very crisp. Like its Kriek cousin, this beer leaves your teeth feeling a big sugary. Another solid fruit beer with great potential  for non-beer drinkers.

Final Verdict: B+

Lindemans - Kriek

Purchased From: Harvest Fine Wines & Spirits
Serving Type: 12 oz. corked, capped, foiled, green glass bottle, poured into a fluted glass

After essentially panning two flavored beers (Long Trail's Blackbeary Wheat and Abita's Pecan Harvest) I decided I needed to prove to myself, and my readers, that I wasn't irreversibly biased against flavored beers. So, I turned to a place I was confident I would be happy. I've had fruit-flavored Lambics in the past and enjoyed them, so that's where I went.

Kriek is a specific style of Lambic beer that is flavored with sour Morello cherries. Lambics themselves are a breed of beer all their own, brewed exclusively in Belgium. The beer has a glowing purplish-red body reminiscent of beet juice. The pink foam head is fluffy with great retention and leave tons of lacing in clearly delineated layers. The nose has a potent cherry scent like black cherry soda. There's also a sugary sweetness that reminds me of Luden's cherry cough drops (a/k/a candy).

The flavor is intense with tons of sweet cherry flavor. The carbonation is extremely strong with Champagne-like bubbles. The beer rounds off with a tinge of sour, grape-like crispness on the finish. Like other fruit beers, this also, unfortunately, leaves a sugar-coated feeling on your teeth after you're finished. But it's an understandable price to pay for this unique and delicious fruit-infused beer.

Final Verdict: B+

Bonus anecdotal content: On my visit to Belgium (the day before my trip to Chimay) we took a walk from the train station, where we arrived, to visit the Cantillon Brewery. Cantillon is one of the few famous breweries producing Lambic beers. The style utilized spontaneous fermentation, which relies on free-floating yeast to turn wort into beer. While there, we sampled their Gueuze (a re-fermented blend of young and old Lambics) and a variety of their flavored beers, including a Kriek and a Framboise (a raspberry-flavored variety). I took a few pictures at the brewery, which I'll look into posting in the next week or so.