Ever since expanding to Milwaukie Breakside Brewery has been putting more effort into their sour program, much to my delight. Last night I had the opportunity to get a first taste of a couple of I'm sure my fellow sour fans will want to get their hands on.
The first was Country Blonde, a Belgian Blonde that sat on grapes and utilizes Brett. It is a very drinkable beer, one that I see appealing to both sour beer lovers and those just coming to appreciate it. Be careful though, at 7.8% plowing through a couple of bottles could knock you back on your heels before you know it. Only a small batch of this bottle conditioned beer was made with 30 cases being available for sale on Friday, December 5th exclusively at their Dekum pub and Milwaukie production facility.
The second was La Torenta, a dry hopped sour ale, which is Breakside's final bottled beer release for 2014. The beer was brewed as a tribute to their senior brewer, Sam, who will be leaving this month to explore lobbyist work. The beer was brewed in 100% stainless, using lacto and Equinox hops, the latter giving it a resinous/tangerine character. It has a little bit of that funk I so enjoy and played nicely with the Arpeada Vache cow cheese from France that Steve selected.
The third beer of the tasting broke stride being both non-sour and one that is a draft-only offering. Simply called Imperial Red, this is a one-off, hop-forward beer has enough body to be balanced and deceptively drinkable at 8%. It was paired with L'Amuse Gouda, a cow's milk cheese from Holland, that had a dry sharpness similar to a parmesan and the combination was great. Keep your ears open for locations that put this on tap and then swing by Cheese Bar to get some of this gouda to enjoy with it.
In addition to tasting these three new beers, brewmaster Ben Edmunds shared other tasty news.
- The Milwaukie tasting room will now have four dedicated sour taps.
- Also at Milwaukie, they're starting "library" or "vintage" flights, in which they'll be cracking open bottles on the weekend, pouring them until they're gone. Then you'll have to sit tight until next weekend to see what they've rounded up.
- They are bringing a new R&D brewer on, Michael Brady from Boneyard.
- They have five collaboration beers for CBC 2015, which will be held in Portland, the first of which is being brewed today with brewmaster Mitch Steele from Stone.
Tonight, November 19th, is the first of two La Tormenta release parties and will take place 5:00 - 7:00 pm at ABV Public House in Hillsboro. If you can't make that one, or you're an eastsider like me, make plans to visit The BeerMongers for the second release party on Thursday, November 20th starting at 5:00 pm. And if you happen to be reading this from the Seattle area, rejoice in the fact that Breakside will be doing a third release party at Bottleworks on Friday, December 5th.
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