Ithaca Excelsior! Brute

Brewed by Ithaca Beer Company
Style: Sour Ale
Ithaca, New York USA

Bottled sample via and shared with oakbluff. Pale gold in colour with strong carbonation. Strong funky brett aroma, along with notes of orange and lemon peel, dark spices, and forest floor. Great juicy sour peach and apricot flavors, along with sour earthy brett notes. Light bodied and off dry with enough acidity to keep things interesting. Refreshing and classy stuff indeed!

Pours the color of hazy dirty lemonade with some snowy white head. The nose is horsey, hay, different fruits (apple, pear, lemon), and some musty odors. Flavors are pretty balanced. Mild sour in the front with som citusy acid in the finish. Very acidic. And tart. Medium body and aggressive carbonation. Dry finish. Pretty damn good for a sour.

Bottle 75cl. @ Papsoes blindtasting. [ Bottle #26. ]
Unclear medium yellow color with a average, frothy to creamy, good lacing, mostly - fully lasting, white white head. Aroma is fruity acidic, yeasty, barnyard, peach - apricot sour. Flavor is light heavy sweet and moderate acidic with a average to long duration, and a dry finish. Body is medium, texture is watery to oily, carbonation is soft. [20090501]

750ml bottle. Pours a light hazy peach with a huge head. Annoying head. Smells very nice, sour peaches, a bit of funk and brett, and a lemon mustiness. Heavily acidic on the nose. Really prickly in the mouth. Salty and really barnyard-y. Spritzy, a little bit of grain, a good bit of lemons. Falls way short of the aroma. Very thin. Overly watery and disappointing. EDIT: Got another bottle of this. Much better than the first bottle in that it is more lush and has less medicinal properties. I still find the flavors to be a little hit-or-miss, but it’s a good, refreshing beer.

In short: An extremely drinkable not-too-sour blonde Sour Ale with a strong barnyard character
How: Bottle 750ml. First batch (only one so far). Consumed almost 1 year after the beer release
The look: Cloudy yellow-blonde body topped by a small long-lasting white head
In long: The nose is very barnyard. Most more barnyard than when the beer was fresh. At the present moment this beer is very barnyard/horse blanket. Taste is a big tart lemon meringue with a slice of banana cake. The body is as full as it gets in a sour ale, this is a nourishing sour ale. Relative to the style the sourness level is medium, this is not the most intense sour ale. A nice dryness. This beer actually feels like a blend that would be 50% not-too-intense gueuze (let’s say 3 Fonteinen) and 50% a highly barnyard Saison. The most classy Brute I have encountered since that large 6’4” dude in a tuxedo who likes to beat-up people while singing Figaro in a perfect soprano voice.

Nose was very heavy of lemons and pears. Poured a hazy golden yellow. Hihgly carbonated, a little too much carbonation, quite champagne-like. Tart, not too sour, nice and musky, finishes bright with some citrus and a little bit of herbs and lemon.

Bottle from LilBeerDoctor - thanks! Nice golden color with a medium puffy head. Aroma has lots of nice citrus, raw barrel, sourness, and some infected white wine - awesome! Flavor matches the aroma with lots of barrel and sourness, but came up just short of CdC territory. A very nice sour that I hope to cross paths with in the future.

I am not big on sours but this one has me really impressed. Tons of champagne aroma and a beautiful golden color. Pleasing tart and sour flavors. Very crisp finish, fantastically refreshing on a hot day. I am very pleased I bought a few bottles of this limited release!