Founders Cerise

 As a pre-Valentine's Day gift (to us both), I picked up some brews. Chocolate is for patsies and hormonal rage mode.

Founders Cerise. A fruit beer. Normally, I would go, eh, a fruit beer, but this is fantastic. This is made up in that state up north using Tart State Up North Cherries in 5 different stages of the brewing process. This will not be made in 2013 due to a shortage in the cherries (weather related most likely). Instead, Founders is making one with raspberries this year. Looking forward to trying this.

With that being said, I was at the Giant Eagle and saw this, had to snag it. This was made in Summer of 2012, so this is a semi-aged beer. Not sure how well this ages.

The pour is a lovely cherry juice color. The picture doesn't show the sheer vibrant color of this. The aroma is straight up tart cherries, with some light tones of malt. First sip- well, what can be said but CHERRY. This is like biting into a fresh, homemade cherry pie. Some sweetness toward the front, but finishing clean and slightly tart. the 6.5% ABV is not noticed at all. Beautiful lacing. I realize now that the glass is half gone now, as it's very tasty and I can't stop sipping it. The best part of this is it's cherry flavor is real, not like a cough syrup cherry. There's nothing bad I can say about this except I want a clone recipe for a 5 gallon batch.

5/5 caps

-Nathan-

I know what you beer snobs are saying: Ew, fruit beer. Fuck off and go buy a four-pack. Oh wait, it's really hard to find now. But this is the fruit beer that all others should strive to be (ahem, Rivertown Blueberry. I seriously need to revisit that blog entry and lower my rating. That is about as bad as Olde English).

Back to Cerise. The cherry nose is not as pronounced since this has aged (I can't, in good conscience, call it cellared when it has sat on a grocery store shelf for nigh 8 months). It has a lovely, biscuity, bready nose, and that lovely red color. And that first sip? Mmmmm, I just sipped a perfect June afternoon. The cherries in here are perfect. And I'm not a cherry fan, unless they are summer fresh. Then hold me back, because I'll be fighting my 5-year-old to eat the entire bag in one sitting. This beer tastes like that. Yeah, it's that good. Have you ever pitted a cherry? Bit into a fresh Bing cherry at its perfect ripeness? That's what drinking a Cerise is reminiscent of (both in color and flavor). It's so good I don't care that I just ended a sentence with a preposition.

But it also has some very credible beer legs. A solid malt backbone, some mild hopping so as not to compete with the cherries. It's fucking fantastic. Founders, you have done it again. This beer is so good that I nearly cried when I saw that it would not be released this year. But I was quickly consoled with the promise of their raspberry, which has not been made since 2008. I can't wait to try it. My only suggested improvement would be to sell it in six-packs instead of four-packs. Because four is not nearly enough.

It's also fandamntastic on tap. Just to note.

And Phil's reaction? He gave it a thrice-eyebrow-waggle. Which means he's pretty much blown away. And followed that up with, "It's really good."

5/5 caps

-Jennie