New Glarus Fruit Beers

Raspberry Tart, Belgian Red, Strawberry Rhubarb, and Serendipity are all excellent in my opinion. While they're not technically sours, they all still have a very pleasant tartness to them.

Enigma was very good, Apple Ale was ok, Old Bruin was very good, Berliner Weiss was very good, and Cran-Bic was good.

I've never had any of the R&D beers, though. Never been in the right place at the right time, nor do I have those kinds of connections.

 

Put up some Jackie O's for trading. If you put up the right combo, you could get it done.

 

I suppose you can find the beers too sweet. However, beer is a pretty wide category...and finding them not "beer-like" is, in my view, and odd expression.

I enjoy some of their fruit beers more than others, but that doesn't mean the ones I don't enjoy are poor representations of the style.

 

My question is, why do people only talk about their fruit beers? I had Spotted Cow a few years ago and I loved it. Also, I hear the Scream Double IPA was pretty good. My cousin went up to Wisconsin, and he got me a NG sampler pack that only had maybe one fruit beer in it. Don't get me wrong, there are some fruit beers I like such as DFH Aprihop and DFH Piercing Pils. But for the most part, it's really not my thing at all.

 

As is MOON MAN!

 

Scream is awesome. All of their ales and lagers hold up really well, I'd happily drink any of them. Hometown Blond is one of the best American Pilsners out there. Edel-pils, when they brew it, is great as well.

 

Fresh Moon Man is better than 99% of the "session" ales out there- only one better in my book is Alpine Hoppy Birthday.

 

They're fruit beers. For example, the WI Belgian Red has 1lb of Door County cherries per bottle. They are sweet beers, yes. They are what they say they are, nothing more, nothing less. In their own, they are a phenomenal example of the style of fruit beer. If you want something more tart as a fruit beer or a sour fruit beer, try something from Jester King, they have fruited sours, not fruit beers.

 

Fruit Beer != Fruited Sour

Almost everything New Glarus brews seems to come out pretty much exactly the way Dan Carey intends it to be. Even if you don't care for NG beers, it's hard not to respect him in a huge way for being able to pull that off, year after year.

 

They remind me a lot of an American version of Lindemans lambics.

 

Your point is perfectly valid, but I think that's what most people (including me) like about them. On my first taste I was expecting a strong hint of fruit or something, but I was blown away by how much they tasted like actual fruit, or pie. I think the amount of tartness is just right and at like 4% they aren't overly sickening. And yet to me, it still tastes like beer rather than simply juice. I guess what I and most others like about the fruit beers is that they just have SO MUCH fruit in them. Like another poster said, there's something like a pound of cherries in every bottle of Belgian Red. That's insane, and you can really taste it.

Humorously enough my dad tried some of the fruit beers and he favorably compared them to wine coolers. Yeah it's vaguely the same thing... I guess...

 

It was only a matter of time until the noob mob declared these all not 'sourz' enough. Whatever.

 

My favorite is the Belgian Red, close second is the Raspberry tart. The Strawberry Rhubarb and Serendipity are both solid as well.

 

Personally I'm a huge fan of all of the fruits! Belgian Red coming out on top and Strawberry Rhubz as a close second. I do have to give an honorable mention to fresh Moon Man, easily my favorite session pale out there. Can drink that stuff for days!

 

Hmmm, I need to try Moon Man again next time I'm in WI. I loved Scream, but don't remember Moon Man being that good. [EDIT: That sounds weird... I remember Moon Man being very good, but not in the range of Hoppy Birthday.]

NG is Hawaiian Punch, but in an awesome way. Lindeman's always disappoints me; I think mostly because they profess to be Lambic and are just so saccharine-y sweet.