New Belgium Frambozen

Brewed by New Belgium Brewing Company
Style: Fruit Beer
Fort Collins, Colorado USA

Poured a clear brown color with a ruby tint and small tan head. Aroma of caramel and sweet raspberry pastry. Flavor is sweet and malty with lightly tart muted raspberry on the finish. Finish is somewhat thin.

A wonderful departure from your typical wheat-based respberry ale. The brown ale appearance may be off-putting for some, but the relatively assertive raspberry aromas and flavors more than make up for it. More hop character than one might usually associate with a fruit beer, but very smooth. The only thing keeping me from giving this beer a higher overall rating is that is suffers from the same flavor inconsistencies that can be seen in other NBB offerings--no two bottles seem to drink the same, possibly due to variations in the fruit, in this case.

It is exactly what it says it is. Nice raspberry flavors swirl around a tangy hops bite. Wonderfully tasty.

What a "mixed bag" this beer is!. Smoooth and lovely, nice head, good lacing, and a wierd smell and taste. With a chocolate cheesecake or a smooth, not overly-sweet desert, this would be okay. I’m not crazy about raspberries, and raspberries are WAY UP FRONT in this brew. At the brewery, on tap, this one was listed on 28 Dec, 2004, as 7.07% ABV (TWO decimal points!), which is different from what is indicated on the bottled versions. In short, if you like chocolate covered raspberries, you’re gonna LOVE this beer, because those two flavors are all you find here. Only enough hops (the guy at the brewery said only Magnum hops are used in Frambozen) to keep a tiny bit of bitter-sour balance: measures only 16 International Bitterness Units. By contrast, SIX kinds of malt are used: Pale, Chocolate, Carapils, C-40, C-80 and Munich. Lambic lovers should love this, I suppose.

12 oz bottle. Thick rocky gouts of foam top the clear, very dark ruby-magenta body...nose expected fresh berries, sour and not-quite ripe with a light overlay of dark chocolate...alas the flavor does not hold up...tartness and sourness are fine, but the fruit is muted and the average brown ale malt character underlying it all is boring and pedestrian...finish rather flat, sour and a touch metallic. A letdown.

Thanks to csbosox for sending this a while back. Clear deeply colored brown body that has a deep red running through it. On top is a generous head of creamy blush that coats the glass as it relaxes and slips below. Tart fruit and cream aroma. Smooth slightly sweet with a touch of fruit that adds but doesn’t over power the malt. Alcohol completely hidden in this. Well balanced, not too tart or too sweet.

Bottle courtesty of csbosox: Brown body that turns to a brilliant ruby (as uriel noted) when held to the light; small light tan head. Aroma smells exactly like hot wort before the hops have been added mixed with snapple raspberry iced tea. That’s caramel, amber liquid malt extract, cereal grains, freshly milled malt, raspberry syrup, and a hint of brown sugar. On the light end of medium bodied, slick, medium lively carbonation. Taste is exactly what you would expect from the aroma: sweet, syrupy malt extract, grains, fresh malt, light chocolate notes in the background, syrupy sweet raspberry, mild bitter tea flavors. Finishes pretty dry with notes of cereal and raspberry. I like it, but just can’t get over the fact that it takes almost identical to drinking wort.

Aroma is of a maly brown ale with some fruit aroma. Body is brown with no head. Lacked the sweet tart bite of most frambozen beer I’ve had. Flavor had a hint of raspberry and the malt made this beer rich enough to leave a roasted ale flavor on the palate. Decent brew.