Without A Paddle
Nomad Brewing Company

Bottle from 2016 Boise stone fruit tasting on 8/27. Light ruby body with a pink fluffy head. Aroma is cherries, cough drops and a whiff of bandaids. Taste follows with the mostly too sweet cherries. A bit cloying.

With its very first sip, the tastebuds realize that a full glass of tongue-bashing, pin-point, earthen-brunt sourness is ahead of you, and that there's no relief from malt sweetness- I'm afraid that you're all on you own!

Light garnet with a deep cherry-red hue, the vibrant and racy beer immediately strikes the olfactory senses with tart red wine, sour stone fruit, dry cider, citrus and a rustic perfume of the farmlands. Must like mature oaked wine, the beer's malt influence glosses over the tongue with the taste of cherry and grape jolly rancher hard candy, but only in one sweet fleeting glimpse.

As the ale opens up on the middle palate, its earthiness is suppressed while its brazen sourness hits its full stride. Along with weathered and leathery citrus, a crabapple, orange, lemon, lime and grapefruit medley plays sharply on the tongue. Red grape, vinegar, dry oak and nutty marzipan offers a complex revolving door of taste to deflect from abrasive sourness. Cinnamon-like and lightly medicinal, the beer's peppery influence shows its youthful and slightly unrefined charm.

Medium-light for kriek, the tastebuds are exactly up the creek without a paddle, a hint of that hard candy remains, lurking underneath all the earth, pepper and acidity. Still, the beer's supreme sourness effectively strips the thirst and quenches the palate. A return of saddle leather and oak return with the suggestion of damp burlap in a fast and effortless finish.