Cuvée De Ranke

Aroma: 10 | Appearance: 9 | Mouthfeel: 9 | Flavor: 9 | Overall: 9

750 ml capped and paper wrapped bottle. Poured in the original De Ranke snifter glass an unfiltered hazy dark amber-chesnut coloured ale with a generous one finger beige creamy foamy head that had a very long retention and tons of micro bubbles. Soft carbonation. Good lacing. The aroma is a rich red fruits sourness, cherries and tart. The flavour is tart, sour and fruity, it is a combination between a flemish sour and a young lambic , with noticeable woody notes. This medium bodied ale has a dry tart and sour finish. A very interesting blended Cuvée brewed in Flandern. Very refreshing.

Aroma: 8 | Appearance: 9 | Mouthfeel: 8 | Flavor: 8 | Overall: 8

Pours out in a shady orange colour with a small bubbly white head. Horse-blanket, stable, blonde grapefruit red grapes and wood in the aroma. Medium-bodied with acidic notes of lemon, brett, mild grapefruit and mild white pepper. Solid mouthfeel. Brett, grapefruit-peels and mild pepper in the finish. Not complex but tasty.

Aroma: 8 | Appearance: 10 | Mouthfeel: 10 | Flavor: 9 | Overall: 10

Extremely pleased with the overall quality of this sour ale. From the first scent I knew I was about to be a really happy man. Pours a thick dark golden color with a collapsing, bubbly head and some spotty lacing. Tart and fruity aroma that opens up the senses. I gathered a fair amount of peach and apricot intertwined with a musty yeast scent. Filling and the sourness demands that you take quick sips to fully enjoy what's offered. A mouth puckering beer that made me continually crave it's delicateness. Sour and tart fruits along with a yeasty doughy malt flavor. A touch of spice and mustiness. One of the best sours I've had to date.

Aroma: 7 | Appearance: 8 | Mouthfeel: 9 | Flavor: 9 | Overall: 9

Sampled from bottle. Pours cloudy gold with a minimal head. Subtle tart, Brett aroma. The flavor is sour; but not too acidic. Delicate. A beautiful need!

Aroma: 8 | Appearance: 7 | Mouthfeel: 8 | Flavor: 8 | Overall: 7

Pours a misty peach color with small, airy head. Aroma is intensely peppery and sour. The flavor is bright and sour with some fruity character and a very dry finish. Interesting and sample-worthy.

Aroma: 8 | Appearance: 8 | Mouthfeel: 8 | Flavor: 8 | Overall: 8

been excited to try this since trying xx bitter years ago .. . fruity acidity and damn refreshing ...cut glass clean .. . very tart, very smooth, maybe to much so .. . thanks travis...

Aroma: 8 | Appearance: 7 | Mouthfeel: 9 | Flavor: 8 | Overall: 8

Pours a beautiful clear golden amber with a decent fluffy white head. The strong, fierce aroma is more like a cider or a brandy than a beer. Flavor is quite strong, mainly fruity with some malty undertones. It goes down the pipes like a tiger on angel dust - fierce, edgy and sharp. Not for the faint of heart!

Aroma: 9 | Appearance: 9 | Mouthfeel: 9 | Flavor: 10 | Overall: 9

Best By Date July 2012; Sampled July 2008
A vigorous pour produces a creamy, two-finger thick, light tan colored head. The beer is a hazy plum color that shows a murky, orange-tinged amber color when held up to the light. The aroma is quite tart smelling with a ample backdrop of fruit notes. A closer inspection yields a nice funkiness to this brew's nose as well. Aromas of lactic acid, tamarind, sour plums, ripe pears, butyric acid, old sweaty leather, musty earth and a fruity ripe cheese note are each noticeable. A touch of soft, toasty, crushed malt is noticeable just a bit towards the finis of the aroma. While at first quite sour smelling a rich, complex fruitiness really starts to come to the for after a short while. This has a very nice nose to it, one which is complex and enjoyable.

Tart tasting, though not as much as many a hard Lambic. The ample fruitiness is still quite noticeable in the flavor with notes of ripe plums, pear, some dark grape flavors, . The finish is distinct and it took me a second to figure out what was going on; I think that it is a substantial bitterness that is noticeable, though not strong; it threw me off a bit because your typical sour beer, much less Lambic has a very reduced hop character. The bitterness in the finish is lightly astringent and almost has an herbal quality to it. In the finish some tannins and the sourness combine to create a sensation a bit like black tea does with a tannic, teeth coating astringency that is only light present in this beer. I really like how the lactic sourness couples with the fruit character. The funk, especially the Brettanomyces derived character is much reduced in the flavor at first, but as it warms up a bit it becomes more noticeable. Sweaty horse blanket notes add a light component, there is a slight mustiness and a bit of barnyard funk.

After the second pour a touch of funky, ripe, farmhouse cheese aromatics join the other, more noticeable notes in the aroma. Uriatic like notes of "cat-piss" become a bit more accentuated as it forms a back-drop to some of the other aromatic notes. The second pour also makes me realize that there is a soft sweetness still in this beer; it is not much, but I think it is what really accentuates the interesting fruitiness that this beer has.

I wonder what the base beer for this is? There seems to be a fair amount of residual hop character, including a herbal hop flavor and it make me wonder if the XX Bitter was included somewhere in here. Just a fantastic beer, it is very sour and funky, but not really "hard" and it is significantly different from the typical sour Belgian varieties of Lambic or Flemish Sour. It doesn't have the malt depth of the latter, nor is it quite as funky/sour or pale (in malt character and fruitiness) as the former. A singular beer that makes me think of some of the new world sours, but it has a refined quality to it (perhaps it is the lack of overt / aggressive oak) that many of the American sours don't quite reach. I could drink a ton of this and actually wish I had more than this one bottle so I could age a couple (that 2012 best by date seems to be calling to me).