The origin of fruit beers is not clear, but it may be a marriage of convenience. If a farmer had some fruit that had seen better days, then juicing it and mixing it with alcohol would leave you with something you could preserve. The fruit would help to add flavour before the use of hops was widespread, and its sugar content would create additional fermentation. Therefore the brewer and the farmer both win. These days the better fruit beers are usually based on fresh cherries or raspberries. Some beers even use gourmet fruit such as Schaerbeek cherries – however the price of the fruit means these are hard to come by.
Belgium shows the best and the worst of fruit beers. Some of the best are from Liefmans, a 300 year-old brewery who still wrap their beer bottles on tissue paper. Their Cuvée Brut is a blend of an oak-aged dark, sour ale with cherries that is left to mature for over a year. The inherent sourness of the beer matches wonderfully with the cherry flavours. Their Gluhkriek is another winner. It’s a cherry beer that is designed to be served warm like German gluhwein and it goes superbly with mince pies.
At the other end of the spectrum are the Hoegaarden fruit beers. Some bright brand manager at InBev decided that since Belgian Witbiers have a hint of orange, why not substitute other flavours by adding syrup and watering the beer down. Hence we have Hoegaarden Citron which tastes like supermarket own brand Sprite and Hoegaarden Rosé which smells like a processed raspberry dessert. Much better are the Huyghe Cherry Wheat Beer and the Invercargill Boysenberry Wheat Beer. In England the Melbourn Bros brewery makes fruit beers the old fashioned way with no hops and using wild yeast akin to lambics. Their beers are so good Sam Smith’s use them as the basis for their fruit beers.
Five to Try -
1. Liefmans Cuvée Brut
2. Melbourne Bros Apricot
3. Lancelot Bonnets Rouge
4. Invercargill Boysenberry
5. Red Oak Blackberry Wheat Beer
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