So I live in a town that has ha a bit of an awakening in the past couple of years. We've had liquor stores with nice import beer selections since I can remember, and later some craft moved in. In the past two years things have really picked up as far as some bars and restaurants serving craft bottles and on tap, a few places that seem pretty good to me. Anyway, I was wondering - in the wider world, is it common for sours to be served on tap? I went to the Mellow Mushroom here yesterday, and they had Brasserie Trois Dames Grande Dame Oud Bruin on on tap. I was really pleased and kind of impressed, because if you knew my town, you'd probably think it was a bit of a stretch marketing-wise. On the other hand, I'm sure it will sell out in no time, there are enough sour-lovers around to drink a pig.
Here in Sonoma County (home to Russian River), we see them quite often. Whole Foods Coddingtown almost always has at least one on tap, and its not unusual to find a sour at Bear Republic. Taps is Petaluma has sours often as well.
Yeah - they're still a niche offering, but if you go to high-end craft bars, they usually try to keep one on tap most of the time. Flanders reds/bruins are probably the most common style of sour, likely because they have a wider appeal. Cisco is the only real local sour that we get on tap. Used to see Cantillon a lot more, but nowadays it is pretty much an event when it goes on tap. Still get the occasional Belgian lambic...
That's true, I had no problem finding Bruery sours on tap when I was in SF. Plus RR sours at the RR brew pub, but that's a given.
A few places in the metro area in MN here have cuvee des jacobins, duchesse, and jolly pumpkin weisen bam on tap right now. I haven't seen any other sours on tap anywhere else around here though.
Not hard to find sours on tap here in Austin. Every decent craft bar usually has at least one Belgian sour on draft. American sours can be a bit tricky... Jester King makes a lot of sours, but generally it's an EVENT when they're on tap and they sell out fairly quickly (they bottle a lot more than they keg).
In Richmond, the smaller beer bars will rotate duchesse or monk's cafe in occasionally. The Capital Ale House chain will usually have some sort of funk on tap, those two beers or petrus aged pale or a brett beer. Mekong is the place to go if you're feeling funky though, they have several going all the time.
rodenbach is probably the only one I see with any regularity, most other sours/ wild ales seem to rotate in and out because there availability is a lot scarcer.
Sours are usually not too plentiful in the LA area unless there is some sort of special event going on.
Ive seen RR sours on Tap in Denver, and Cantillon on tap at The Avenue Pub in New Orleans. Pretty rare to see anything like that here in the South East though, unless I am going to the wrong places.
