Difference between 3F krieks

About $20.

 

I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure the Oude does not use Schaerbeekse cherries. I'm also pretty sure the new batched of the Schaerbeekse are using a mixture of cherries, including Schaerbeekse but not exclusively. Feel free to virtually slap me if I am wrong here.

 

my god, i just tried this for the first time on saturday.. freaking fantastic funk!

 

I think Armand uses his best lambic for the Shaerbeekse Kriek. Unless things have changed I thought I heard tat one point a few years back that he used Polish cherries and not the Shaerbeekse cherries with the regular Oude Kriek. The Polish Cherries are cheaper and easier to source than Shaerbeekse ones. I doubt anyone is growing cherries in Sharbeekse these days as it is very urban.

 

I've been told exactly this as well.

 

There seem to be two different beers with Schaerbeekse cherries. The relationship isn't clear.

http://beeradvocate.com/community/threads/schaerbeekse-oude-kriek-abv.28807/

 

That other site entry is a few years old, and things may have changed.

 

Right, the Oude doesn't use Schaerbeese cherries. As for the other, I think you may be right. It fits some things I've seen in pictures of labels.

 

I'm betting that in "fine" print after the "van Schaerbeedkse Krieken" it also says "35%."

 

I rhink, but can not prove, that there are 3 beers under discussion here. One of which is a variant of Oude Kriek that seems not to have made it into the database yet, so I think you have the opportunity to add a new beer with your review.

One beer is the Oude Kriek, which is made with cherries (Krieken).
A second beer is the Schaerbeekse Kriek, which is made with 100% Schaerbeekse cherries.
The third beer is the Oude Kriek, van Schaerbeekse Krieken 35%. (Which is made with 35% Schaerbeekse cherries and which all seem all to have been Oude Kriek bottled in Apr 2010. Lots of information developed through using Google images points to this as well but I didn't look at every picture.)

The most recent bottles I've had of Scharebeekse Kreik were bottled in Apr 2011. They did not have the van Schaerbeekse Krieken 35% on the label and were unambiguously labeled exactly as the picture on this site shows, i.e., Schaerbeekse Kriek.

This all points to your beer being an Oude Kreik made partly with Schaerbeekse Cherries (35%). Whether that was instead of something or in addition to the other offereings I don't know. Whether it has been/will be repeated I don't know either. I also suspect that a number of recent reviews in the BA database for Schaerbeekse Kriek have actually been the Apr 2010 bottling of Oude Kriek van Sharerbeekse Krieken 35% since there were clear instances of the van Schaerbeekse 35% Oude Krieken being mistaken for and reviewed as the Schaerbeekse Kriek in the data from Google Images. I just hope that you didn't pay the Scharebeekse Kriek price for your van Schaerbeekse Krieken Oude Kriek.

 

It was a relatively fresh bottle of the 3F Schaerbeekse Kriek that convinced me that the fuss made over those cherries in a Kriek is well deserved and might just justify the $35-40 price tag here in the US.

 

I was told a few years back by one of the brewers at De Ranke that they also had to switch to polish cherries for the Kriek de Ranke a while back. The claim was that the Schaerbekse cherries were 4-5 times more expensive increasingly difficult to get at all. Schaerbeekse is a very urban area and there just arn't farmlands there anymore not a huge pressing need for farmers to grow this obscure cherry variety. Most brewers would probably prefer to use the Schaerbeekse for kriek beers but at the end of the day they would have to jack up the pricing of an already pricy import (Us sales) when the average consumer may not actually know the difference.

For me you can absolutely taste the difference. Try a Cantillon 100 % Kriek next to a Lou Pepe Kriek sometime and you will see what I am talking about. Admittedly I have never done a side by side with 3F however.

 

Of course you'll tell the difference between the Cantillon kriek and lou pepe kriek. LP Kriek is fruited at a rate of 300g/L versus standard at 200g/L, a 50% difference. The cherry variety isn't the only variable.

 

Looking at a US Shelton Bros. labeling of the bottled in 2011 Schaerbeekse Kriek. It says blended lambic, brewed with Schaerbeek cherries, aged in oak.

It also says on the back "for years very rare Schaerbeek cherries have been prized by brewers for the deep rich color and flavor they give to Kriek beer".

It doesn't say 100% or only made with Schaerbeek cherries anywhere on it though.

 

You are correct about the amount of cherries... I also know that JVR always uses his best stock of lambics for the Lou Pepe stuff.

That being said the difference is HUGE. The 2008 LP Kriek when it was fresh was perhaps the best beer I have ever had. The 2008 100% Kriek was pretty middle of the road in comparison.