3 Fonteinen: Framboos: Oogst 2017 (Belgium: Fruit lambic: 5.3% ABV)
Visual: Deep black-cherry red. Still.
Nose: Fresh, tart raspberry. Sweet cherry notes. Sweet black cherry notes. Clean and fresh. Light wet twigs. Rounded red wine – Pinot Noir.
Body: Dry. Dry white wine notes. Tomatoes. Pinot noir. Tart raspberry. Light wet wood. Very clean. Tart cherries. Strawberry. Blackcurrant.
Finish: Tomatoes. Yellow raspberry. Fresh raspberries. Slight tannins. Dry white wine. Plums. Blackcurrant.
Conclusion: I had a bit of a worry on first sip of this. It has some of the tomato notes I had found hurt the 3 Fonteinen Hommage when I had it a while back. When I tried it back then I had thought that the set of notes were down to the sour cherry used in that beer, but I’m having to rethink that now. Anyway, when I encountered them again I was worried, was I going to have another bad experience with a very expensive beer?
Thankfully, no. Though that savoury tomato like element is there, the other flavours, including a mass of tart raspberry, play a much larger part. The bigger fruit character brings an almost pinot noir, heavy, fruity richness and booming character.
So, with that said, let’s take a step back and look at the beer as a whole. It is very clean feeling on the lambic side – tart and fresh but with no funk yeast character and low amounts of tannins – with only a little showing in the finish.
The body is tart, but with a heavier red wine weight, along with lighter and drier crisp white wine notes around the edges. It results in something that plays with sour and tart character, but without getting bracing or mouth puckering as a lot of the classier lambics can.
It shows a lot of the vinous and red fruit notes – now obviously there are raspberries, but also sweeter cherry and even some strawberry notes at times, going into richer plum notes in the finish. In the finish is also where the tomato notes tend to hang around. Not my favorite thing, but the more vinous notes makes everything a bit more balanced here.
Th extra fruit gives some some extra thickness over the dry lambic character – again giving more booming red wine character to the beer. Over time the tannin character does rise, especially in the finish, but now with a slight note to the body. The mouthfeel and flavor both getting more rounded and rewarding as time and heat do their thing.
So a very good beer, albeit with occasional tomato notes. Those few off notes means that I wouldn’t drop the money on it again for myself, but there is enough going on that I think that for people who don’t get the same imagery I get from that then it will definitely reward them even more.
Smooth and fruity up front, hearty, oaken and tannin touched red wine by the end. If only I didn’t get those tomato notes then this would be awesome.
Background: Been looking for this one for a while – it has a very good reputation and is bloody hard to find. So, it turned up in Independent Spirit and I grabbed it, despite it being quite hefty cost to buy. In case you are wondering Oogst 2017 basically means it is the 2017 vintage. Makes sense, right?
Had just finished watching series 2 off Castlevania on Netflix, so put on a compilation of different versions of “Bloody Tears” to listen to while drinking. Again, makes sense, right?
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