Far Yeast: Offtrail #30 Bramble Scramble (Japan: Fruit Sour: 8% ABV)
Visual: Hazy apricot skin colour, and thin white loose head.
Nose: Gooseberry. White Wine. Wet twigs. Black-cherry yogurt. Apricot skin. Tart apple. Yeastie funk.
Body: Tart. Apples. Vanilla. Black-cherry. Twigs. Gooseberry. Apricot crumble. Dry. Raspberry. Bourbon.
Finish: Dry cider. Dry white wine. Tart pear perry. Brown bread. Peppery. Oaken. Blackcurrant. Yeast funk. Leather. Faint plum. Bourbon.
Conclusion: This is a very well made fruited sour – very fruity, very fresh but without overpowering the dry, tart, white wine to lambic like sour beer base. Utterly refreshing and lovely and sharp to drink.
Frankly I have no idea what fruits were used to make this as flavor wise it seems to be trying to express them all! From a gooseberry tart front in the aroma, settling into a sweeter black-cherry, then a mix of cider and peppery character that seems to permeate the entire thing on the tarter side. Then you get hints of blackcurrant and plum along the edges for darker hints – this has so much fruit all expressed in a tart acidic fashion.
It never loses itself in the fruit though, there is always an alcohol weight to it – not harsh just making it evident this is not just fruit juice, and an oak and twigs vibe that calls to the time in the wood. Heck, I don’t know what barrel this was aged in but there are almost bourbon like spirit undertones to it. The base beer is not quite a lambic (in fact look in the background for what I was surprised to find out it was) but it sometimes leans that way in white wine dryness and slight leathery notes in the base, with lots of evident funky yeast character showing the sour beer style well.
Frankly, I’m surprised I’ve not heard any buzz about this brewery before as this is a fantastic sour beer base, fantastic use of fruit and barrel aging and fantastic overall.
If you see it grab it and try it, it is excellent.
Background: This was another one grabbed from Tanakaya Liquor store when I was there. That place has such a fantastic selection. As a fruited sour it seemed like an unusual one to grab, I hadn’t seen too many of those around in Japan. Also “Far Yeast Brewing” fantastic name. Greatest brewery name ever. They used to have a different name but it was dull so they changed it to this masterpiece. A google suggests “Offtrail” is a name for a set of beers they do outside their usual and there seems to be quite a few of them – looking at their website some of them look amazing, wish I had time to try more. One web page seems to suggest this is based on one of their IPAs or a sour IPL, my ability to translate leaves me confuse on that one– either way something I would not have guessed in a month of Sundays – which they then proceeded to barrel age as it came out better than expected. Also turns out I had a minor cut on my lip when drinking this, something the sour acidic character revealed to me very quickly!
