Bottle shared in London - cheers to Cloin. Pours clear deep red with a creamy pink head. Light sweet flavour with bright but dry berry character, cherry, low bitterness, mellow acidity. Medium bodied with active, massaging carbonation. Quenching finish, tangy cherry. Solid.

Bottle shared at craft beer junction bermondsey tasting. Many thanks. Clear reddy, pinky, cranberry cough syrup. Flavour is composed of semi sweet, tangy, fizzy cherry. Nice. Sour tangy. Prickly. Nice smoky cherry, pithy,

Huge, layered pink to deep-rose, rather stable head over beautiful deep red-purple beer, lively carbonated. Intense farmyard nose, ripe red fruit, cherryjuice, balsamico, wooden (wine)barrels. Qutie sour initial flavour, leading to dry-out effect and lipsmacking acidity. Gradually an intense sour cherry flavour develops, mirroring the ripe Schaarbeekse krieken, fruitjuice, hints of resin and pinewood in the background. Wheatacidity blends into the fruitacids, and somewhere fruitsugars are hinted at. Medium bodied, Champenoise carbonation, fruitslick. Acidthinning. Excellent kriek, doubtless, but having tasted Boon's kriekenlambiek from the lagertank, I was expecting even more intense fruit.

Bottle, 2020 edition. Color: Clear dark purple, largepurple-pink head. Aroma: Cherry, funky notes. Taste: Very smooth mouthfeel. Lightly to moderate tart and sweet dark cherries, rural funk and oak wood notes. Hints of hay and cherry kernel. Long lasting fruity and dry-ish tannine finish. Medium body, below average carbonation. Very nice Kriek.

750ml bottle shared with my brother. It pours deep purple with a decent fluffy pinky white head. The aroma is sweet, juicy, crunchy, ripe cherry, cherry jam, bakewell tart, raspberry pip, fizzy sour candy, tangfastics, dry oak, leafy and fruit compote. The taste is crispy, dry, snappy, tangy, juicy, sweet - sour, crunchy red wine, very big on the cherry, jammy, Bakewell tart, light acidity, granny smith apple, lime peel, fresh, zingy, funk is fairly muted but there in the backdrop, tangfastics and sherbet with a drying, damp wood finish. Medium body and moderate, foamy carbonation. Super fruity and juicy. Fun stuff.

0.75 l bottle from 'Beyond Beer', 2020 vintage, bottled on October 2021. Clear, deep ruby with a medium large, frothy, quickly diminishing, pinkish white head. Sweetish, slightly sourish, quite fruity and slightly funky aroma of sour cherry, bitter almond, elderberry, blackcurrant and a touch of horse blanket. Gently sweet, moderately sour, very fruity, slightly funky and a bit vinous taste of sour cherry, lots of oak, horse blanket, blackcurrant, elderberry, overripe lemon and white pepper, followed by a medium long, gently tart, fairly woody-dry finish. Medium body, gently astringent and quite effervescent mouthfeel, average to lively carbonation. Lovely Kriek, super refreshing summer thirst-quencher but at the same time very sophisticated and complex. Typical Boon quality, always reliable.

Deep ruby red, colour, pink foam. Sweet and tart, lots of cherries, some almond, medium carbonation.

Newly released cherry lambic by Boon, made with 270 gram of 'Schaarbeekse' cherries, generally regarded as the most perfect breed of sour cherries for lambic and therefore invariably explicitly being referred to in name and label as a special quality mark; an earlier Schaarbeekse kriek by Boon (released during the penultimate Toer de Geuze and bottled in 37.5 cl bottles) was made with an only slightly more modest 250 gram of these cherries and probably back-blended, whereas this one seems to contain one single lambic only, of eighteen months old - which is what I suppose the name "Millésime" refers to, in parallel with what is custom in the champagne world. Bottling took place in October 2021 (so an additional eighteen months of bottle conditioning has taken place as well). Comes from a 75 cl bottle with classy label with glossy letters, cork and muselet, opening with a bang and releasing some gunsmoke. Thick, dense and frothy, loudly crackling, plastery-lacing, lovely pink-tinged head, very pillowy and firm, resting stable on a misty, deep carmine red robe with vermillion tinge and lots of visible 'champenoise' sparkling. Aroma of cherry pits and sour cherry flesh, old oak wood, dried tree leaves, some typical 'Boon chlorine' (swimming pool) tucked away in the background, unripe nectarine, blackcurrants, sour apple peel, wood sorrel, pickled lemon, parmesan rind, old dusty closet. Spritzy, tart onset, very fruity as can be expected of course, with sour cherries filling the mouth immediately in a juicy, crisp way; some of that typical 'Schaarbeekse fleshiness' is certainly there. Side notes of fresh blackcurrant, rhubarb and lime adorn an ongoing, richly textured cherry fruitiness, dominant over a deeper yoghurty lactic streak and a cereally core, accompanied by increasing bitterish tannins from cherry skins and pits - though that fleshy element persists nicely, even when the cherry tannins are amplified by pronounced wood tannins. Light notes of retronasal Brett funkiness appear (old leather, damp hay - but no outspoken goat stable or anything like that) and a deep, bit leafy old hop bitter note echoes from the deep, but the sour, mildly bitter and very fainly sweet fruitiness of the Schaarbeekse 'griottes' remains the star of the show till the last drop, adding further fleshiness and vinosity in the finish. Altogether a well-constructed 'Schaarbeekse kriek', in a slender, elegant, sleek and supple way; quite accessible for its particular (sub)style, but genuine and rich all the same - even if, from sheer memory, I think I liked its 2019 predecessor just a notch more for being even 'fuller'. A side by side tasting would prove interesting, no doubt.