Kronenbourg 1664

Brewed by Kronenbourg (Carlsberg)
Style: Pale Lager
Strasbourg, France

Wow, this proves that the French CAN be dull!! Golden yellow, poor head, no lace, no aroma to speak of, and a palate that leaves you searching for... something, anything to talk about. No kidding, I really feel that this has even less character than mass-produced below-average stuff than Canada’s Labatt’s and Australia’s Emu Bitter. Not bad, just featureless.

Lukewarm, unpleasantly bitter metallic suds atop a plastic beaker half-filled with ice. OK, so probably not the ideal conditions for sampling a ’premium lager’. The refreshing, sweet maltiness of this beer is best expressed chilled, and at less than 36,000ft.

Just a hint of skunkiness. Some bready aromas, and grassiness, hops as an afterthought. Just not very good at all.

This came across as too harshly carbonated. The first flavor was interesting--subtle spice?--with hoppy bitterness, but as I drank more it became overpowering, and indeed, I found it difficult to finish, much less enjoy.

Definite grassy hops in the nose. Some hay and cereal malts also. Sparkling golden appearance as expected. The flavor is bitter and a little on the earthy side which is a nice change. Malts are sweet and bread like. Pretty good example of the lager style. If you like lagers you will like this beer, otherwise you will not. Overall pretty typical but not bad. This is a good beer to have with a meal.

Dark gold color, fair malt nose and a bit of hops. White head and decent lace, adequate, but not great. Once again it’s hard to overcome my bias against ’Blond’ beers. While its drinkable, will be lucky to make my top 250. Still for the ’Lite’ beer crowd, you will like it, clean, refreshing, just not a hit with this grissled olde dark beer lover.

Yee-haw -- a chance to savage the French! A little skunky, though not bad. Lager-tart and a little fruity. Very carbonated, but a fair mouthfeel, tough there were some musky notes in the finish. Interesting bottle. Not bad, but not distinct enough to buy it again.

On tap, Dora Keogh, Toronto. Light yellow pour, large white head. Surprisingly hoppy aroma, which was promising. Flavour took care of that though, just nothing going on at all, fizzy, and entirely inoffensive. I will admit, there was a little bit more of a malt character to the body than the appearance suggested. Pretty bland after a promising start.