Drie Fonteinen Armand'4 Lente (Spring)

For whatever reason it's the hardest to come by (less made? I don't really know). So expect it to take 1.25x to 1.5x what the others took.

 

I traded a BCBVS to get a Lente 1:1 if that's any help.

 

I hope you took that trade... I LOVE Winter.

 

I've only had Winter and Herfst...but those are some of the two best sours I've had in my entire life. Even with the high cost, I still think they are some of the best "bang for the buck" sours out there.

Tastier than many walez I've tried, even though wale status doesn't necessarily mean good.

 

I believe you're correct, but I don't really get it. They're all great, I'm not sure I could pick a favorite (though it's probably not Herfst, way overcarbed).

 

I believe it has something to do with the fact that it was the first to be released in the series so at that time, there was a lot of hype around it and the bottles got snatched up pretty quickly. Also, and I'm sure you remember this, these 4 beers were released all within about 3-4 months of each other. I think the people that were buying them up had less and less funds as the series continued (at the time, they were all about $65-$70 shipped) so the later ones sat on the "shelves" for longer. At least I know that that was what happened to me. I told myself I'd get 3-4 bottles of each. But after springing for Lente and Zomer, I was only able to invest in one each of Winter/Herfst.

 

I suppose the limited money would make sense, but it still seems really odd that you can still get any of the others basically whenever, but there's no Lente anywhere. It's bizarre to me, I'd expect a smaller effect than that from people going nutso on Lente early.

 

Nm, I don't want to be right with the statement I just deleted, even though I know I will be. Not worth the likes I won't receive now.

 

now I'm curious...

 

I'm curious to see what happens now... I just checked and BiaB appears to be finally sold out of them all, and Etre claims to have only 9 Herfsts left.

 

I think we all are.

 

There's still some Herfst on the shelf out here. Going for $76 last time I looked

 

A big reason Lente is the hardest to find is that it has had, from the very beginning, the highest ratings out of the set. I just looked, and here's the breakdown:

Winter = 4.4, 125 reviews
Herfst = 4.53, 146
Zomer = 4.65, 198
Lente = 4.77, 263

Not only is it the highest rated, you'll notice, it's also been reviewed the most - which would indicate that fewer bottles remain relative to the others. The higher reviews naturally give it higher demand, and this higher demand has helped reduce its supply, so it's only natural that it trades for more than the others. It's also got the highest W/G ratio of the set, fwiw.

It'll be interesting to see how the reputations for the various seasons change as they develop with age. My sense is that Winter, which was thought to be clearly the worst fresh, is having quite the resurgence. I haven't heard a bad word about Lente, though, so my expectation is that in a few years all four seasons will be seriously sought after.

 

With the risk of sounding like MikeTen, there were 17,000 750ml bottles. Just throwing that out there now that we're bringing up numbers. However, I'm still willing to clear out the cellar for the set.

 

I thought it was 17,000 for all four seasons, so a little over 4,000 each. Substantial, of course, but hardly an enormous number considering their one-off status.

 

4250 per season. So yes, hardly enormous. I only wish I had sought it out earlier.

 

Lente was also out first so has sat around longer to be snatched up. I don't exaggerate when I say Lente is the best beer I've ever had (although Zomer is close) and now that traded bottles can't be replaced by another purchase, people are tightening up with these.

 

Would you say it's worth 47 euros shipped? I'm thinking about getting a bottle here in Spain.