New Belgium La Folie

Reddish-brown pour with a tan head. Aroma is sour and woody. Taste is lip smacking, mouth puckering sour, vinegar, and wood. The taste of it affects different parts of the tongue, the flavor lingers, and then you get the dryness. Each sip is as tasteful as the first. Worth the price.

I’ve wanted to try this one so I was happy to be able to bring back a bottle while traveling. The aroma is of wild berries, some vinegar with toasty caramel sneaking in there. Dark reddish-brown pour with a thin tan head that doesn’t stick around too long. This is very puckery tasting up front with sour berries and some apple and vinegar notes. The flavor is long-lasting into the finish which is a touch dry. There’s a sour burn in the senses while drinking this. This is good but it didn’t overly excite me as despite being really puckery and tart it seems a bit straight forward and not all that complex. Perhaps the intense sourness masks some of the other stuff going on.

This is a very sour beer with a multitude of carbonated flavors. These include grapes, dark cherries, and sour apples. The aftertaste lingers on the tongue and in the back of the throat.

Bottle from Icecody69, thanks! Reddish dark brown color. 1/2009 version. Cherry, grapes, oak and lemon in the aroma. Very sour, oaky flavor with notes of apple vinegar, grapes, cherry and hints of marzipan. Without knowing the brewer you can tell that there are strong family ties between this beer and Rodenbach Grand Cru. However, the sourness of this beer is just within the limits of the acceptable. Almost totally dry, maybe hints of caramel. Long sweet apple aftertaste. Absolutely delicious Flemish brown, born in the USA.

Thanks to dear Pablo B. for this sample bottle. No doubt at all that it’s a sour ale. Poured with a nice light tan head and good lace. Color is a lovely clear mahoganey. Aroma is very clean, tart, refreshing. Flavor is a giant sour Belgian ale, more like a geuze than a Flemish. Good body and great carbonation. Finish is so tart to say anything other than that. Not a session.

Poured dark amber brown, tart fruit, malty, caramel, wood, little dark fruits in the finish.

bottle. deep, dark, purple, garnet. this is the most sour thing ever. immediate heartburn sets in as the stomach acids eat away my throat. vinegar, tart berries, citrus acid, and maybe caramel. painful to drink. not sure if this needs to age...but i just can’t handle this stuff as sour as it is right now.

22oz bomber. Pours a deep amber brown with a medium-sized short-lived head. The aroma has some toffee malt sweetness, some funky fruitiness (rhubarb, sour cherry), and a strong dose of sourness with an acetic bite. The flavor is such a mesmerizing dichotomy: acidic through and through with some funky and earthy sourness, but also quite malty with notes of chocolate malts and other dark malts. Unfortunately, the sourness begins to take over after several sips, which makes the beer a little more one-dimensional, unfortunately softening/hiding the beautiful nuanced maltiness. The finish is sour and earthy with strengthening notes of vinegar, but also some sour fruit characteristics. There are pleasant notes of dark malts and toast in the finish, too - just barely fighting their way through the sour. The mouthfeel is acidic and crisp, like a tart sparkling cider - but with a little more vinegar-acetic quality. Overall, a very pleasant sour ale. The sourness is quite intense at times, but the beautiful malt character layered underneath saves it from being too sour or unpalatable. Funky and interesting for sure.