Between the Staves
Crooked Stave Artisan Beer Project

 

 

Had on tap. Another winner from crooked stave, with yet again a sour that has good mass in the malts and yeast to carry the sour pucker strongly with becoming too acidic. Big sour oak accenting the huge apricot, orange, lemon and grass. Wood has nice character to it. Smell more fruity than taste, light, bright, and pleasant.

 

an amazing new collaboration with anchorage, a totally different beer than the one by the same name that came out with the anchorage packaging years ago, although that one was awesome too. this is done in crooked stave packaging, and is a wild beer brewed with raspberries and spruce tips, a super unique combination, and it works brilliantly in the beer! easily one of my favorites from crooked stave in a long time. the fruit colors the beer only a little bit on the draft pour, faint pink on top of a brassy orange brew, short head but lots of carbonation. i smells the berries and the spruce together, piney and woodsy and almost festive to me, the berries are more tart than sweet, both natural and fresh picked to me, and they come through really well in the taste too, equal in proportion but with the berries sort of first and the spruce later on towards the finish where hops might usually pick up. the complexity here is awesome, lots of winey oak on this to my palate, tannic and tangy too, bacterial, and funky as well, really mature base beer, more than just sour, actually interesting on the fermentation profile, different than what i have gotten used to from these guys lately, so many have been similar in that regard. the fruit and the pine go so well together, i didnt expect the union to be so natural and awesome, but it really is, especially with all the wood on this. somewhat softer and more subtle raspberry than a lot of their other beers that use it. amazing stuff, sure to age well, the spruce is so cool with the fruit!

2018-11-16
750ml corked/caged bottle. "Harvest 2017", "Golden Sour Ale Aged in Oak Barrels with Raspberries & Spruce Tips".

Pours a clear brassy golden with a medium sized head that fades fast. Smell is very oaky, tart, fruity. Just a hint of funk.

Taste is nicely tart, spruce tips don't come right out at you but kind of alter the tartness a little, I get some fruitiness that I wouldn't necessarily associate with raspberries, but could be. Wood clearly comes across.

Mouthfeel is dry and light. I like this beer.