Sour beers used to sit solely in the expert realm of the Belgian specialist or the hardcore beer nerd.
But these days, sour beers are bursting into the mainstream more and more – especially as sour beers are no longer just for summer.
So with that in mind, in this post we look at some the best sour beers and sour beer makers operating both here in the UK and abroad.
Whether you’re just getting into sour beers or you’re expanding your repertoire, these are breweries you’ll want to check out.
Most of the very best sour beers are either seasonal or one-offs. Craft breweries make them, at most, once a year. Then they try to make something even better.
That kind of means that looking for the ‘best sour beers’ in general is a bit futile – because that list changes month by month.
So what you really need to take note of is the best sour beer makers. Because – trust us – their latest sour concoctions will always be amongst the best sour beers you can buy at any one time.
Still with us?
Great.
If you like sour beers, then you need to check out what the latest beers of the following breweries…
Like their name suggests, Vault City used to be pretty hard to come by – almost as if they were only accessible to beer-tickers armed with bumbags and tasting notes booklets.
Recently though someone unlocked the gates, and beers from these Scottish sourmeisters are now popping up in most good bottle-shops and online beer shops with their weird an wonderful wares.
One thing that should sharpen your attention towards this brewery is that they are sour specialists – and to be more specific, sours are all they make.
At the very heart of Vault City Brewing lies their house mixed-culture. A bit like the sourdough starter yeast, a sour brewery’s house culture is their foundation. It has to be pretty special to create something so unique.
Vault City use a blend of Kveik and Lactobacillus strains which provide us with delicious tropical esters and a deliciously tart acidity. These esters are added to the pulps of real fruit in Vault’s amazing concoctions to make fresh, smoothie-tasting brews.
They have created “straight up” versions like Strawberry and apricot session beers, and have an amplified version of these too – typically reaching 8 or 9% ABV.
If you fancy something a bit more wild they have dabbled with spiced pumpkin, tayberry (it’s like a redcurrant I’m told) and vanilla.
Latest fun releases include a cheeky Vimto sour and a Havana special! I don’t think there’s a better UK brewery at using natural ingredients in their sour beers. Vault City beers are very much worth unlocking.
We first stumbled across Polish brewery Maltgarden when one of our best customers told us in glowing terms about some of their hoppy beers which he’d managed to wrangle on a beer-swap night.
Knowing Charlie was a bit of a top-end craft beer nerd, we knew they must be something special so we got hold of some swiftly to try for ourselves. He wasn’t wrong; Maltgarden make huge hoppy modern beers.
Then we discovered their dark beer range which was even better – full of peanut adjuncts with lashings of coffee, toffee, banana and chocolate all over the show (there’s even a wax topped can but that’s for another time).
We then learned that they made mad sours too – is there anything this brewery cant do? (They actually haven’t made a lager but that’s not the point!)
Maltgarden are certainly a brewery to seek out if you want a range of flavours that really push your palate. The newest sours from them include additions of dragonfruit and mango.
As we say, they like to play wizard a little bit and don’t be surprised to see the juxtaposition of nuts and spices added alongside the sour notes to really compliment but also throw your tastebuds.
If a warm can of Tyskie is your only experience of Polish beer change that right now!
Pastore Brewing and Blending is a mixed-fermentation sour and wild brewery, and everything about this brewery hints at the exotic.
The name itself makes your mind maybe wander to a small, hidden Spanish village, and Pastore’s can artwork and font drag your thoughts out to a sleepy Moroccan fishing village. Almost disappointingly, Pastore are actually based on an industrial estate near Cambridge.
Where Vault City are possibly the UK’s best sour makers for fun brews, Pastore are a more refined and subtle competitor.
The emphasis here is on accessible, fun, modern takes on mixed-ferm brewing (which just means using different yeasts in one brew, including wild ones), and the technique helps ensure Pastore sours deliver every time.
Although the basis of all their beers is in the old school of sour brewing, there’s enough fun ingredients and flavours poking through to open the doors to the non-expert beer fan. The newest beers on our shelves are perfect examples of this.
Torta Di Morello, for example, is a cherry pie pastry sour, conditioned on morello cherry puree, cinnamon, vanilla and almond. How good does that sound?!
They are a brewery we love supporting. Not only do they make some of the most rounded sours about, they are a tiny operation even by craft beer standards, a story made even sweeter by the fact the brew team are family father and son combo of Ben and Chris Shepherd.
We get new Pomona Island beers in pretty much every week, and with good reason.
Again Pomona Island are a brewery that seem to be able to nail all the styles of modern beer going. It’s testament to their quality that we can talk about their sours when we could easily feature their dark offerings or hoppy monsters in round up posts elsewhere. It’s also testament to their amazing beer that we tend to cherry-pick their beers from the fifty or so new beers we get each week to drink ourselves for pleasure (yes it’s one of the worlds best jobs!)
Pomona sours somewhat launched the brewery to the relative mainstream in craft beer circles with brews that were tart but not too tart, flavoursome but not messy and crazy but easy drinking. It’s a hard thing to manage, especially time and time, again but Pomona manage it.
A relativity small operation based in Salford near Manchester, Pomona seem to bring out a pale, IPA and sour each week, so there’s always something interesting and new to go at!
Whatever sour you end up drinking – enjoy.
Thanks for reading out craft beer blog this month. Drink and be happy.
Oli, Craft Metropolis founder
Five years ago, when my online craft beer club (as it then was) first sprang into existence, Craft Metropolis stocked only beers from specialist, London-based craft breweries. It gave the club a new slant on an existing concept. It allowed us to operate as a tiny business in a market dominated by one or two major players. And, as was the case more than once in the early days, it meant I could drive around London to pick up stock and deliver orders whenever a ‘reliable’ supplier let me down. More than a few companies go on about their commitment to personal service these days. I wonder how many of their owners are willing to drive to their customers’ homes to meet delivery deadlines?
That was five years ago. In time, we began to branch out. Tastes developed. As did demand. Today, as well as continuing to support local craft breweries, we’re increasingly supporting some carefully selected craft breweries from outside the UK. Seeing as we all love good beer, could I maybe introduce you to three such gems?
Gamma Brewing, Smedeholm, Denmark
It’s an unavoidable fact that imported beers are pricey. The cost of shipment needs to be accounted for. And increasingly these days, breweries favour cold-chain shipments (keeping their beers cold all the way from production to sale, for freshness). It’s another factor that eeks up the price. So when you look for imported beer, it’s pretty crucial you don’t end up wasting your furlough payments on brews that aren’t up to scratch. Gamma brews, I reckon, are among the best bang-for-your-buck imports anywhere in existence.
There are two sides to Gamma’s unmistakable MO. On the one hand you’ve got their clean, hoppy, smooth and expertly executed beers. On the other, there’s a rotating smorgasboard of murky hop-monsters. There’s an air of Burnt Mill about the brews on offer (Burnt Mill being a UK-based brewery I also love). Just like at Burnt Mill, the Gamma brewers seem to take a lot of time and care over all that goes into each of their creations. From ingredients and flavour profile to design and even can art, there’s something in these beers that signals nothing was rushed and no corners were cut.
Gamma are a wonderful example of the art behind brewing great beers.
Amundsen Bryggeri, Oslo, Norway
It’s quite something that, despite being a craft brewery, Amundsen has become Norway’s biggest brewery. It’s a well deserved accolade for a brewery that prides itself on their craft. ‘Created by Craftsmen’ is the brewery’s motto, and a delve into any of their wares will return a strong reward for anyone looking for something unique and unconventional.
Sweep aside the (perfectly good) hoppy beers and shuffle straight to Amundsen’s loopy section – dark, sour, barrel-aged; this is where the real fun is. The DIC (Dessert in a Can) series is a great example of what this brewery does so well. These imperial stouts have none of the grown-up appeal of, say, a Kernel or a Buxton beer. Instead they swing right to the other end of the spectrum, combining high sugar, heavy adjuncts and 10%+ ABVs to create beer monsters and flavour freaks. Who’s for a can of Chocolate Covered Salted Toffee Popcorn? Or a Hazelnut Praline Chocolate Truffle stout? A Unicorn Sprinkles Strawberry Doughnut? You get the idea. Wonderful, wacky stuff.
The cans themselves reinforce the madness, adorned with glooping marshmallow-style text as they almost always are. While the concept isn’t for everyone, just to think about making such unorthodox beers – let alone going ahead and making them – is a triumph. And as the brews have helped make Amundsen the biggest brewery in the land, they’re clearly much more than the gimmick purists might suggest.
Equilibrium Brewery, NY, USA
If you want the best hoppy beers in the world then America is where they are. Said a sheep-like beer drinker. More than once. It’s an oft-argued ‘opinion’ that inevitably leads to discussions on craft beer’s beginnings.
In the early days, the discussion goes, the UK made ‘real ale’. Decent stuff, and certainly an improvement that curtailed the exponential rise in mass-produced lager. The Americans tried it. They fell in love with both the idea and the product. So enamoured they were that they took real ale back to the States and started tinkering with it. They added some experimental and out-there hops. They brought it back. It was amazing, the revolution was born and the UK has been playing catch up ever since.
That’s one way of interpreting the current state of play, anyway. The flip side is UK breweries such as Pressure Drop, Polly’s and DEYA are all making beers at least as good as, if not better than, their trans-Atlantic counterparts. But whichever way you look at it, it’s hard not to agree that the US has historically been and remains a driving force for the changing face of craft beer worldwide. Today, the UK and US seem to rely on each other for new ideas and inspiration and team up to push the boundaries of craft brewing ever further. It’s against this backdrop that the appropriately named and Equilibrium Brewery continually comes up with some of the most sought-after beers either side of the pond. Whether it’s enjoyed via Equilibrium’s lactose-laced Double IPAs or their juicy Triples, the quality here is always assured. If you want to see what all the whoopin’ and hollerin’ you hear about stateside brews is all about then look no further. Equilibrium showcases all.
Thanks for reading out craft beer blog this month. I hope you enjoyed it.
Oli, Craft Metropolis founder.
Step 1
We trawl the globe tasting great beer
