Additional notes 06/20/23 (Pictured)

Now $7.99 for the 550 mL bottle, from Horrock’s Market, Battle Creek, Michigan, USA.

Fourteen years on, and almost identical thoughts to those that are given below. Strong raspberry seed on the nose, and still quite drinkable if you can get past the slight, cough-mixture feeling. Color is still amazing!

To be honest I don’t hate this beer, BUT about once every 14 years is the correct frequency!

Original notes 06/10/09

550 mL bottle from Hop City, Atlanta, GA, USA. $5.99.

Intresting to say the least. I first came across the cherry version of this, bottled in London in the summer of 2007. I quite enjoyed that, so I thought it would be a good bet that I would like the raspberry and strawberry version recently arrived in the US – started with the Raspberry.

The beer pours with an amazingly deep, crimson color and a HIGH, pinkish head. Decent lace. Doesn’t look a great deal like beer, but it IS exceptional in its appearance, hence the “5”. Carbonation seems high at first but settles down to be more “beer-like”.

Nose has an acidic fruitiness that I would not necessarily associate with raspberries, but it does smell fruit based and not “fake”. Seems natural.

Lots of raspberries in the taste and up front that is all that one can really experience, BUT as the beer drinks down the bottle I find that the fruit notes begin to fade a little, more dry, almost lager like malts start to come through. By the end of the bottle the beer is finish more like beer than fruit juice.

In the end it is VERY drinkable, but it is a context/novelty beer for me. Sam Smith’s has obviously taken the low road here and gone for the combo market of women, youngsters, summer, novelty, organic and sweetness. I’d imagine that in those markets this will do well. I prefered the cherry version; strawberry is up next.