Liefmans Gluhkriek

Brewed by Liefmans (Moortgat)
Style: Fruit Beer
Oudenaarde, Belgium

Had this cold and hot. Hot is very strong fruity cherry spice with some alcohol. Taste is very overpouring and not enjoyable, though noteable due to its unusual fizzy and warm. Cold is a far better experiance. Aroma is cherry to a new level with some red wine notes and these seem to clash to create a cardamon aroma which plays with your nose a little, excites it slightly. Taste is very sweet cherry with spicey notes, mainly ginger and corriander with again a little red wine playing in there. Pritty much entirely flat as the style id imagine is supposed to be. An unusual experiance, one to try again hopefully.

Cold: A dark red that seemed translucent to the light but I couldn’t see my finger through it. It had absolutely no head. Aromas were of hot, spicy cinnamon and cloves, it reminded my of those fish shaped candies I used to hate getting at halloweeen. Tasted like those French griottes marinated in alcohol, it was sickly sweet with a dry finish, as if the sugar recrystallized when mixed with my saliva.

Mulled in the microwave: Seems a tad darker shade of red, the spices seem more mellow and harmonious, like a spicy herbal tea. The booze is a lot more pronounced in the taste, it feels warm and rich, the cherries are cooked down and the cloyness tamed.

Strange, considering that I prefer Unibroue’s Quelquechose chilled, but this one was far superior mulled.

This beer introduces itself with the sweet smell of cherries. It is a dark copper colored beer that produces neither a head nor any lacing. This beer incites the tongue with a sweet cherry taste that smoothly fades to a nutmeg taste as it flows down the throat.

Bottle. Warmed to 70C. Murky red-brown with minimal head. Low carbonation. A spicy kriek; kriek-glögg fusion?. Actually quite sweet but saved by the spices (cinnamon, cloves, some nutmeg?) and pleasent tartness. Can’t say it did much for me.

Bottle (from Bitter Virtue BBE Oct 10)
Small sample cold. Taste of cherry throat sweets with extra sugar. Bleagh.
Warmed to 70C. Sweetness fades slightly, cherry still apparent but not as throat sweets and tempered by spices. A nice change from a standard mulled ale or wine but as it cools throat sweet flavours reappear - drink it quick.
The mulling spices weren’t really assertive enough for me and I prefer my mulled drinks more aggresive - like vin chaud made with rough alpine red unsuitable for doing anything else with. The cherry flavour (when warm) did however work suprisingly well - which gives me an idea, a tart kriek lambic mulled!!

Bottle, warmed. Cherry red colour, creamy mediumsized reddish white head. Almond and cherry in aroma. Cherry and "glüwein/glögg/glögi"-sh flavour. Quite sweet, but very nice when warm. A string of alcohol also exists.

Bottle, 25cl. A very reddish beer without head and carbonation. The nose is strong, very sweet and with cherries all over the place. Flavour is again cherries with a medicinal finish. This one can become very sweet. Too much, if you don’t like cherries like me! Not my type of fruit and not my type of beer.

Personally I thought that the cherry flavor was too biting. It just came on too strong for my liking. The smell reminded me of sweet vermouth. We first tried serving it chilled, but that was a mistake of the worst kind. Once we heated it up it got better, but I was still dissapointed in this beer.