Kiwami Plum Sour
Fuggles Beer

Pretty strong but it tastes great!

Cloudy purple-tan color. The head quickly drops back to a thin skiff across the surface with tiny bubbles coming from below. There was no lacing.

Funky sour smell with tart plummy fruit. Swirling the glass kicked up the funk a notch with a hint of barnyard.

Very tart (not far enough to be sour) with a lot of plum fruit coming through. Light malt like a white bread toast flavor under the plum jam. The aftertaste is mostly plum skin with a mild bitter added.

Quickly bursts into a fine bubbled foam with only a little tongue tickling. Medium body. Somewhat astringent.

Even with all the plum, this still tastes more like a beer than a cider or radler. The color is a bit strange, but well within the range coming out of the F&W brewery. This is my wife's current favorite beer now that the lighter summer beers are all gone.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Appearance: Pours a hazy grapefruit red, actually very close to the colour of flesh inside a red plum. Very quick rising and dissipating head made mostly of large erratically loose bubbles.

Aromatics: Not a lot given away in the nose department here. A little sweet dough with “maybe sour” fruity notes, unless I’m developing a cold the plum scent is missing for me, but there is a rather bright citrusy undertone to that “maybe sour”.

Taste: Great pucker. I have a good dozen sours under my belt now, and they definitely range from “just bit into a lemon” to “meh, more tangy than sour”… this is in the former - It does have a good kick at the sour can. I love things sour and/or spicy so when it makes me pucker and smack my palate on the first sip it’s pretty decent, if I squint too then its really good, this was close to almost squinting. Of course you get used to it after a bit so it lessens each sip. But sour it does have - now other flavours I get include a decent lemon/lime citrus and red plum is there. I know, because I just picked one off my tree and had a bite after the first few sips for comparison. It is tart and tangy as well, but the sour is more prominent than those. There is also subtle flavours of peach and cherry in there, and maybe a tad of sweetened wheatgrass.

Feel: Good middle-of-the road body, lightly carbonated and buttery smooth. Finish is fairly expedited leaving a slight yeasty-fruit flavour to linger.

Overall: I think a fairly good sour. If it makes me pucker, I’ll like it. Good fruit choice(s) in the flavour profile. I enjoy most of Fugggles’ fruit explorations - I think I like this one so far most. They usually fall short, they promise you some sort of fruity experience and it seems to come up short (Strawberry Wit, I’m looking at you…) But all-in-all this is pretty good for a kettle sour, so I recommend it.

Pairing : I’m going aesthetics here - they were going for a Japanese or Asian theme so I’m going to go with a couple Asian suggestions. Though I believe most sushi will go great with this beer, I think I would enjoy a good firecracker chicken (this is probably a North America thing - but spicy hot chicken instead of a fish protein), a roll of tomago (sweet egg) would be fantastic, really balance out that sour. And of course plenty of sweet tempura sauce for dipping. On the warmer side of things, a really good gyoza (by good I mean stuffed with chicken+pork+vegetable). Another good alternative would be a thickened hot and sour soup with lots of large chunky mushrooms and tofu.

Fuggles & Warlock 'Kiwami' Plum Sour @ 6.3% , served from a 650 ml bottle purchased for $7
A-pour is a fruity pink from the bottle to a hazey pink in the glass with a small white head leaving a spotty lace along the snifter
S-plums
T-tart start , somewhat bitter swallow
MF-mild carbonation , light/medium body
Ov-again just an ok beer/sour
prost LampertLand

650ml bottle - another Japanese-themed (marketing-wise) brew from this (still?) Van City contract brewer. Wow, what a pain in the ass label to photograph, amirite?

This beer pours a murky, dark apricot amber colour, with one rather skinny finger of weakly foamy, and mostly just bubbly dirty white head, which leaves but a few streaks of remote islet lace around the glass as it quickly sinks out of sight.

It smells of bready and doughy pale malt, lemon and sour cherry fruity notes, a bit of musty farmhouse funk, overripe plums (strangely second-billed), near spoiled milk, and a plain earthy and grassy green hoppiness. The taste is somewhat tart black plums, bready and grainy pale malt, understated yeast, a muddled earthy spiciness, some sour lactic essences, and more unheralded leafy, weedy, and floral hop bitterness.

The carbonation is average in its palate-probing frothiness, the body a solid medium weight, and mostly smooth, with a wee airy creaminess wondering if it will ever get permission to land. It finishes off-dry, both the understated plum and lingering malt trying to make a game of it, as such.

Overall, this is a rather commendable attempt at a fruity sour ale, as the plums in question exhibit both the yin and the yang of their inherent kind, which makes for a very enjoyable and engaging kettle sour ale experience. Worthy of trying out, even if the label makes your eyes hurt.