A Taste for Sours

Petrus pale is vile piss water. I can't stand that beer and I like sours.

 

Same here. Will never forget that first time.

 

Haha you say that every time this discussion comes up. That is your opinion and you are welcome to it. To balance it, I will say it was the first sour I tried and enjoyed it. But that beer (and sours in general) can be a love it or hate it kind of thing.

To the OP, if you don't care for them (at least at the moment), I wouldn't try to force myself to like them. Just try revisting them another time down the road. It is amazing how our palate's evolve with time.

 

Supplication was my first sour. It was so good I felt like standing up and doing a cart wheel in the middle of the bar

 

I do, I do. That beer hardened my heart I guess. To me its one note of sour followed up with some ugly acetone after taste. It was one of my first ventures into sours, and I wish it was a forgettable one. But, not to sully the conversation with too much hate, I will say that sours are polarizing. My suggestion to the op is to take it easy and not force the issue. Some sours are subtle and elegant, and others are face puckering and over the top. Start with a berlinner weisse or maybe a more mild wild ale to get your feet wet. Get ahold of dfh avant ppeche, great beer to get your toes wet on. And there is always the possibility that maybe, despite the hype and trendiness, these beers aren't for you. And that's okay, life is too short to drink vile piss water...

 

I loved Sour Patch Kids growing up, still do, so fruit lambics are my favorite style of them all. And my first sour was Supplication- phenomenal. And then a month later I went to Cantillon in Brussels and that, as they say, is that.

 

I would definitely give Rodenbach Classic (Red) a try. I am on a sour kick after visiting New Belgium during GABF. Peter Bouckaert came to New Belgium from Rodenbach, and any sour from NBB is fantastic. Someone had previously mentioned Transatlantique Kriek, great cherry flavor here and very balanced.

I know you can't get NBB in New Jersey, but if you make it to Delaware you can grab some there.

 

I don't like sours that much and am okay with that. I love the Anchorage series, and think they are underrated or underhyped - not that it matters.

The sour beers I tend to enjoy are ones that use sour as a component and not the means to an end.

On the plus side, if any friends are splitting some, I usually take only an ounce or two to try. And sours seem to be pricy, so I'm saving money not chasing them down.

It is nice to see I'm not the only one who isn't a big fan of them.

 

Sounds like for a few of you started at the top (RR or Cantillon) of the list and its only going to be downhill from there. I'm jealous

 

I'm spoiled. Started with RR (Supplication, Consecration and Temptation) and never looked back. I love sour candy and fruit so I suppose it was natural that I love sour beer!

Rodenbach is one of the best sours to start with IMO. It's very balanced, has some nice fruit flavors and is cheap ($10 per 750ml)!

 

Lots of American sours use the same mix to sour them, often they try to mask vinegar infections. So there I can understand your point. For something like Lambiek or Oud Bruin seems a bit harsh to call them “Emperor’s New Clothes”. After all it is very much grounded in tradition & complicated to make. They are simply not for you. Might as well call Rochefort or Weihenstephaner the “Emperor’s New Clothes”. No need to drink them if you don’t like them.

 

First of all, sour beer is not a style, thus there is a larger variation than asking for recommendations for IPAs. You could group certain styles of beers into a category but it would be like grouping pale ales with IPAs and DIPAs. Obviously a big variation. "Sour beers" range in taste from sour lemons to drinking lactic acid (2 different types of sourness IMO). My recommendation would be to look up some styles that are considered sour such as lambic, gueze, Flanders, berliner weisse, and of course American wild ales. Look at their descriptions and see what sounds best to you. There are many different types of sour as there are many different types of sweet.

 

A quality Gueuze is a good intro to a mild, very classy sour but they are expensive.

 

Which American sours would you say were trying to mask a vinegar infection?

 

Jolly Pumpkin Lambicus Dexterius comes to mind. As does Rivertown Lambic, that being said, I did enjoy them.

 

I said I will keep and open mind and that "I just don't see it'- for me. I've already spent close to 40 bucks on different different Cantillons (don't tell my wife) in an attempt to appreciate the style and all I taste is sour beer. My son loves to eat lemons, some people just like sour tastes and some don't I guess.

 

The thing with Cantillon with age the fruit ones get quite sour, they are intended to be drank fresh. If you drink them when they are just made they are so fruity, it is almost like juice. They are way cheaper than 40 $. The more special ones are 7 – 8 € for a 75 cl. at the brewery. People give lager the benefit of the doubt for being different locally etc. lots of beers & styles are differently locally. Cantillon is harsher than most, 3F Geuze is for instance not even really sour. Like the new 3F Golden Doesjel is mellow down to the point that Armand specifically said that you cannot even call it sour anymore. Belgian sours are about balance, it is not like sucking a lemon but rather like having a drop of vinegar in a salad. Oud bruin is almost more sweet than sour in its traditional form.

It is just a lot USA beer geeks prefer these beers to be quite sour so they age them or seek out the sourest examples. The local brewers cater to that preference. It is a mater of preference just like USA IPA’s are very bitter, USA sours are very sour. Just like beers have variability in bitterness so do they in sourness. In lambiek sourness has never been the point or objective. No blender strives to achieve it, an overly sour lambiek is seen as a failure. The 3F Geuze’s illustrate that point best really, I wouldn’t really call them sour per se even.

 

I would love nothing better than to buy you a beer at the brewery and you show me what's what with sours. Merry Christmas.

 

Bell's Oarsman Ale was the first sour I tried that I liked. It's a good berliner weisse made in Michigan. Next were a couple randoms. One really agreeable sour is Lindeman's Framboise, but a lot of beer geeks would laugh at that, since it's really sugary and sweet (raspberry flavored too). Birthday suit is a sour brown that's pretty good by Uinta Brewing. Duchesses de Bourgogne and Strubbe's Flemish Red are both nice flander's red ales. All of these are pretty widely available. I don't think any of them are too sour from what I remember.

One disclaimer I would put on other people's posts here is that Brett doesn't really make a beer sour in my opinion. It's a lot more funky, and might make the beer a little "tart" but the earthy, funky flavors will dominate by far. Just a warning to those that are looking for sour beers who keep getting told to start out with something made with Brett.