Sour Crusher - Mango
Skygazer Brewing Co

 

Slicing, peeling and carving mangos is no easy task, so might as well crush them. And when they are in a sour ale, then that job gets considerably easier.

Skygazer's mango flavored Sour Crusher gets going with dense orange appearance, opaque from its dense and fruity fog. It's froth reveals a juicy, radiant and tantalizing tropical scent that's tribute to the reckless amounts of mangoes. A rich sweetness of pastry dough, fruit preserves and a fruit rollup, any suggestions of malt come across as cereal fueled fruit juices.

As radiant as the beer opens with its full mango focus, the sweetness lifts only slightly on the middle palate to reveal an undercurrent of sourness that plays out like milder versions of lime, lemon, cider and wine. Although the sweetness slowly fades, its juiciness remains and balances the acidity while adding complexity to the mango additions. Trailing into a vinously tangy finish, the beer leaves impressions of bellini, apricot and orange on the late palate.

Medium-full bodied and certainly fuller for sour ale, the base sourness gets lost in the fruit addition, but does provide a tangy foundation for the fruit. Finishing fruity and tart, the ale extends into a medium length aftertaste of tropical fruit, cider, cereal and sourdough.