Cantillon Lou Pepe Framboise

Brewed by Cantillon
Style: Lambic - Fruit
Brussels, Belgium

On tap at Teresa’s Next Door. Pours a hazy pinkish amber with a small bubbly white head. Aroma was tart, a bit funky, raspberries...really tough to describe...but very pleasant. Flavor was also tart, lightly sour, raspberries, acidic yet fruity.

Date: 02/21/2004
Mode: Bottle
Source: Tasting, RateBeer SE Gathering, 2004

hazy amber, tart malt aroma, big tart malt flavor with a touch of sweetness,

Aroma: 5/10; Appearance: 5/10; Flavor: 5/10; Palate: 5/10; Overall: 10/20
Rating: 2.6/5.0
Score: *4
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75 cl bottle. Reddish beer with a small head. Aroma of really dry lambic and some raspberries. Very tart and sour in flavor when the yeasts are not blended in, gets smoother and better with the yeasts. Left a small burn in the finish, acidic and fruity on the palate.

Reddish brown of color with a reddish head. An aroma of raspberry, raspberrystones, nice sour and no sweets. A flavor with young raspberries, no sweets, nice sour and stones from raspberry.

25.4 oz bottle, 2003. Clear but dense ruby with glints of orange and purple. Light white froth. Color alone is just amazing, surreal. A big sour kick in the nose followed by old suitcase, wild raspberries and finally preserves. An incredible sour-funk-tart-sweet blast leaves me agape after a few sips. At first tangy fermenting peaches with a woody mushroom funk and cherry pits. The initial assault on the tastebuds ebbs as mouth-watering raspberry mousse emerges. Totally wild, yet earthy. At times this made me cringe and wince but nonetheless compelling. A psychedelic beer experience.

Lucky enough to drink this from tap at the Bier Circus in Brussels, I liked the Lou Pepe Framboise. The bouquet and body burst with raspberry. Tart but not overly so.

About a 4oz pour from a 750ml bottle
2004 vintage, consumed Aug, 2007 (3 years cellared)
The bright shiny ruby pink body sits about 60-80% opaque in my glass, with only a small white ring on top that pretends to be a head. That’s fine, though, and expected. The rich and deep ruby red hue in the center of the glass loses it’s luminocity as the depth thins near the sides of the glass, which is colored only a soft whitish-pink. Nose is primarily candied raspberries, doesn’t really have much seed/hair/stem flavors from the fruit, only a slightly sweet fruit scent. I don’t want to use the term sugary because that would imply a high level of sweetness, and the nose is not very sweet at all, but the raspberry quality is sweet and as much as it pains me to say - underdeveloped, as well. Only 3 years in the bottle, though, so that’s expected. You really need these things aged at least 5-6 years for the trademark Cantillon caustic sourness to develop. Still, I can’t complain too much, because it’s Cantillon and they do gueuze like noone else. The flavor is interesting, beginning as a creamed, candied raspberry flavor, more of a sugar sweetness than a true fruit sweetness, and over the middle it quickly turns silky smooth and numbing, then quickly turns rough and tingly, even pasty, with some light acetone flavors showing up near the back, then a salty bite at the back of the mouth. The finish actually does have some seed/hair/stem, moderate tartness, and of course a proper corrosive sourness. I will need to either find a 1999 or 2002, or put some of this 2004 away for a few more years to rerate.

Bottle. High pink fluffy and quickly disappearing head. Hazy dark red body with a good deal of yeast sediments. Acidic cherries aroma. Powerful acidic raspberries flavor. Low carbonation and a nice long acidic to sour aftertaste. I wonder if iit can be made much better.