Bell Rates... Stella Cidre Pear

type: Pear Cider
origin: Belgium
ABV: 4.5%
location: House
served: 568ml bottle to glass, over ice


So InBev have augmented their 'Cidre' with a pear version, presumably hoping to challenge Kopparberg's domination.

I can't really blame them. After all, their standard apple version is basically a Magners clone, with toned down flavour and colour, and Magners have a pear version (to try and challenge Kopparberg) so why shouldn't Stella?

Thus, we now have a Pear version - but shouldn't that be 'Poire', keeping with the French-language branding? Or, even better, 'Poiré' - which is the French name for pear cider.

Smell: As with the apple version, there's hardly any aroma at all. A slight hint of pear, but . 2/4

Colour: A very pale greenish-yellow. Actually looks a bit like weak soda water and lime, certainly more than it looks like cider. 1/4

Taste: Definitely less sweet than Kopparberg, and less flavoursome. About on a par with quite a few of the generic pear ciders, and definitely drinkable if no alternative exists. 2/4

Overall: No cider brand is complete without a pear version these days, it seems, but the Stella version is pretty generic. Another basic cash-in, rather than any attempt to make an interesting new product. 5/12
  
"C'est poiré, not pear cidre!"

Bell rates... Stella Artois... again

type: Lager

origin: Belgium

ABV: 4.8%

location: Carrick Stone, Cumbernauld

served: pint glass 

please note: the following review is transcribed from notes I took in the pub, while very drunk.

McGoooooooo, despite being a skinny, ginger, lightweight, stingy cockbag is buying me a pint of Stella Artois. This has been owed to me for over a year, due to me generously allowing his abhorrent soccer team (Glasgow Celtics) to win some sort of Cup last season. The photo of this is probably below.

So anyway, I previously rated Stellafrom a bottle. McGoooooooo was outraged and has boycotted the blog since since then, due to its realistically low score.

Smell – see how there's the 'wet dog' hop aroma? Aye, well this is a but further towards 'dog pish'. 2/4

Colour – quite green. Wtf is happening there? Probably why McGoooooooo likes it. Right sort of paleness, but it's probably down to rice. 2/4

Taste – more aftertaste than bottles, but it's not like it's a better taste than the bottles, so 2/4

Overall – nice glass. Decidedly average beer. Better on draught,  I will concede, but still not great. 6/12

Bell Rates... Stella Artois Cidre

type: Cider

origin: Belgium

ABV: 4.5%

location: Biergarten

served: 568ml bottle to a glass, over ice

"C'est Cidre, not Cider" the billboards claim, as the makers of Stella Artois try to convince us that their new product somehow transcends mere fermented apples, and is actually some sort of high-class, luxury drink that is the toast of Belgian high-society.

I'm not convinced.

It's a served-over-ice cider, and call me cynical all you like, but it's going to fit into the same bracket as Magners, Bulmers and Kopparberg. It's InBv's latest attempt at plugging a hole in their all-encompassing market strategy. It's a great BBQ cider, ideal for a lazy summer's evening, but it's not a Martini, or a fine bottle of Beaujolais... whatever that is.

It's cider. People in pubs will order it as such:

"Bottle of Stella cider please."

"Want a glass with ice with that?"

"Aye, please."

is how it's mainly going to play out.

That said, it does look good in a beer garden. The bottle is a fairly classy design, with a chunky, high-quality look, and a gold label that complements the colour of the cider well. Once poured (over ice) you get a refreshing, easy to drink pint, politely described as 'rounded'.

It's a cider that 'non-cider-drinkers' could probably drink quite easily. There's very little taste of alcohol, and very little aftertaste. There is a little bit of apple in there, but you need to be looking for it. It's not unpleasant by any means, but it's clear that InBev aimed directly for Magners with this one, and only missed the mark by a short way.

Smell: There's nothing bad to say about the aroma, but most of that has to come down to the fact that it hardly smells of anything. 2/4

Colour: A very Magners-like pale orange, but just a little bit paler, in my estimation - outdoing their Irish rivals in getting their watered-down Irn-Bru tone one step lighter than Magners itself. 2/4

Taste: Less sweet than Magners, with less aftertaste and less prominent flavours. Slightly acidic, but overall very drinkable due to its inoffensive nature. 2/4

Overall: Not bad, but not Magners. Slightly less of all the important bits (or at least the bits I use for ratings, anyway) and slightly more of the premium branding. 6/12


The 'Stella Artois' part of the name becomes clear when you consider all of this, as this really is the cider equivalent of Stella Artois Lager. It's got the same sort of characteristics as its namesake - generic, commercial, mass-produced - and will probably sell just as well. The marketing strategy might as well have been "Reassuringly Expensive" again... or just "More Expensive than Magner's" since everything else about Stella Cidre seems to have been developed using that as a yardstick.

It's disappointing that InBev just rolled out a generic cider, with no real uniqueness to it, stuck a familiar brand label on it and were satisfied with that. They could have created something new, launched a genuinely new product, with a genuinely new brand identity, but they weren't feeling adventurous enough.

The Premium over-ice cider market has a few 'big-guns', and Stella Cidre is a 9mm with '.44 Magnum' stamped on the side.


more info: http://www.stellaartois.com/cidre/

Bell Rates... Stella Artois

type: Lager

origin: Belgium 1

ABV: 5%

location: Biergarten

served: from a 284ml bottle to a glass

Stella Artois... apparently it's 'Reassuringly Expensive', and apparently it also promotes domestic abuse. 

This review can sadly neither confirm these rumours, nor deny them, as the Stella I sampled for the occasion was left in my house2 at some point by a guest, and I'm not married.

What I can confirm, however, is that Stella is your basic mass-produced, commercial lager. It states that it's a 'Premium Lager Beer', but in the market segment Stella resides in, you can pretty much call anything you like 'Premium' and sell it on the price, rather than the quality. But let's not get too far into slating it at this early stage, there's still plenty of review left for that!

Smell: It presents a decent smell, with a hint of citrus, which is not too overpowering. Not that notable, odour-wise, but definitely not a bad smell. Fairly basic, basically. 2/4

Colour: I found Stella to be quite disappointing in the colour department, as it was slightly lacking, and it looked a bit watered-down, in essence. It edged slightly towards looking quite sickly and pale - but not pale in an attractive way, the way that a lager is supposed to look. no half-marks in this system, so it gets rounded down to 1/4

Taste: Pretty decent, and quite drinkable, all told. A bit over-hopped, and very bitter, but not in an unpleasant way. Some 'mainstream' lagers at around the 5% mark compromise taste for alcohol, but that's not so evident here, leaving it unremarkable enough to have a few pints and not get tired of it. Very little after-taste, but that probably works in its favour to a certain extent. 2/4

Overall, an easy-to-drink beer, and probably one of the best of the mass-produced, commercial lagers, actually. Stella is a viable option where choice is limited, and it's inoffensiveness would make it a good 'session' beer, if you were just out to get blootered. 

But then, I suppose that's the whole point of Stella, isn't it? 5/12

Notes

1. 'brewed in the UK', but it says 'Leuven, Belgium' all over the packaging.

2. Rule one of Bell's House: if you leave it in my house, it belongs to me. 


more info: www.stellaartois.com