Coreff Ambrée
Brasserie Coreff

 

Got this one at the supermarket while on vacation in Brittany, France.

From a bottle into a snifter
Best before May 2015

APPEARANCE: This one’s a slow foamer. Pours a one finger, medium looking, white head with decent retention. Burnt orange, clear, with medium levels of carbonation. Eventually fades to a half wisp leaving some nice lacing down the glass.

SMELL: Melon, slight toffee and some floral hops on the nose. Medium strength.

TASTE: Mirrors the nose well. Toffee and floral hops up front with some white bread at the finish. Medium and sweeter finish with caramel notes, hints of toffee, grainy malts and a light floral bitterness.

PALATE: Medium body and medium carbonation. Creamy smooth on the palate, goes down fine and finishes slightly dry.

OVERALL: A decent amber beer. The feel and look sets it apart from the others in this rather monolithic style. Worth drinking if you’re in the area and need something other than pale lagers.

Pale amber with a loose soapy head. Skunky nose with mulchy grain, both faint.
Red berries, esp raspberry, and crusty white loaf with tea leaf and herbal hops.
Slight chocolate end and moderately bitter linger. Round, smooth, light, fizzy, thin, dry.

Oddly fruity, but bright and clean. This is supposedly a French take on an English ale? Not sure I see that, except maybe for the late hopping. Different altogether, without being distinct. No sign of the lactic/infected notes others mention.

Not sure what this is supposed to be, but maybe this is just how the French do it, and not offenisve, so can't really fault it.

A - Amber color, bordering on brown. Cloudy. Not much head on my pour.

S - Smells like it's going to be sour, lactic acid. Some earthiness reminiscent of beers with peat smoked malts. Funk.

T - I'm confused; this tastes like a beer from Flanders instead of Brittany's first British style ale. There's earthyness, a touch of lactic sourness. Lots of oaky wood flavors. I don't taste any sign of hops. It's very sweet, in the initial taste and the finish.

M - It's a bit watery and a touch puckery, also kind of cloying.

D - It's complex, kind of wierd, and doesn't go down that easy.

This one's a puzzler. I want to like it, but I'm not sure if I do or not. It's an adventure.

Beer bottle (33cl), tasted in 2000.
Appearance: amber color with creamy foam
Smell : caramel
Taste and mouthfeel: dry beer, somewhat bitter finish
Drinkability: beer in the style of an English ale brewered by Coreff

Review added 11-17-2007, translated from french 2-26-2008.

A red brown beer with a very small head and some yeast particles floating in it.

Smell was slightly sour, like lactic acid or something. There is the caramel touch, and in combination with the acidity I smell cherries.

Taste was also "fresh" and caramellic, with some cinnamon. There is a slight bitterness and it sizzles on my tongue. I can't seem to figure out whether the sourness is intentional or by accident. There is not very much balance, to put it on other words, there are not a lot of flavors in the beer. Body medium. Aftertaste is dry.

The colour is dark and muddy cocacola, the head it is not too compact, and not too thick.
The smell is winey, with grapes, dried plum, pandispagna and redcurrant.
The taste is again dried plum, and malty. Winey again, but less.
The body is nothing special, medium-low. In the aftertaste points of bitterness, not too long.

All beers by Coreff are non filtered. The Ambree has a really dark color and almost no head. I thought the smell was kind of winy, which didn't make the beer very appealing.

This beer has a low carbonation, and its taste is really bitter. It tasted like coffee, with maybe some hints of caramel by the end. In comparison with other French Ambree I had, this one really lacked some sweetness. Bitter was the most important impression I had while drinking the beer.

I don't think I would want to have another one after the one I just had.