Lambicus Kriek Black Pepper
Brouwerij Timmermans-John Martin N.V.

Pours a lovely sparkling red with pink foam. Smells of cherries and spices. Taste is mostly cherry but not cloyingly sweet. The last lingering taste is pepper.

This was like $25 USD per 4 pack at a Central Market in DFW, TX.

11.2 fl oz brown glass bottle with pry-off crown cap.

4% ABV.

I can't say the black pepper imparts much of anything, but I do get plenty of gooey cherry pie flavour and some powdered sugar covered raspberry flavours. Slight acidity. Fruity.

Not horribly sour, which is a bit of a let down. Any woodsy notes from the barrel are quite faint.

Some may find it semi-medicinal. I'd call it sweet for a kriek (if not saccharine), but it's not a bad brew - just a bit sickly sweet if having a full bottle or more in one sitting. Those hoping for rich bacterial sourness and smacky tart cherry twang should look elsewhere, but it's a nice little kriek if you don't mind them sweet - if a bit pricey stateside.

C+ / ABOVE AVERAGE

Being a Euro-Saison head (an aficionado coined by StoneTrippin'), I shy from Lambics and food. But not so with Lambic laced with black pepper. It actually fit my dish well because it was bland and needed pepper. Timmermans' fit the bill.

Pretty to Look at, it also kept its foam to the end. Smells were sweet, but still balanced. Tastes were also, but really subtle with the black pepper really not being obvious until the finish ... when the food required it. Better than medium-mouthed, this also was soft and gentle.

The Timmermans-John Martin partnership continue to advance the craft. I should pay more attention to them.

this is way cool, i love them spiking some of the classics with fun new ingredients! i enjoyed the hibiscus framboise recently, and now this kriek with black pepper, somewhat more subtle, but genuine and delicious, cool to add some straight up fun into the sometimes stuffy lambic game, im for it. pretty color, almost flamingo pink from the little bottle, clear and sparkling until very close to the bottom when a little dribble of sediment clouds it slightly, beautiful color and quite a bit of head on it, fine retention too, somewhat nicer overall than i remember their normal creek looking, but it has been a long time, too long. the nose is kriek first, sweet but with some subtle lambic tang, red wine vinegar more than funk to me, tartness from the fruit too, but more sweet than sour as they sometimes are from timmermans, clean though too in a unique way for lambic, lemony, and with the black pepper there only late, honest but pretty subtle, unique with the natural spice the fruit and ferment bring, an easy integration but still very unique, and before i even taste it i think how cool it would be just with the peppercorns and no fruit at all! maybe someday. the flavor is sort of two stage, with their recognizable kriek first, probably the first like two thirds of this, sweet and fruit forward, lightly tart, then the pepper on the back side, the overlap is brief but wonderful, the pepper is just cracked and spicy, honest and marrying well with the cherry, which goes a touch medicinal at this stage. this lacks the truly spontaneous funk i love in the best lambic beers, but its also not hurting for complexity with all that the pepper adds, and it works in both the sweeter and more puckery moments of this at the end, lovely recall after each sip, tastefully dosed i reckon, not hard to place but certainly not on the level of the fruit. some will blast this for being too sweet, but that critique is less applicable in this special edition, where the pepper does a lot to balance the back end. light bodied still even with the sweetness, good carbonation, more spontaneous funk would also work here, but it works without it too. i liked this a lot, love the genuine black pepper aspect, great with the cherry, really digging these more exotic editions!