Russian River Consecration

Brewed by Russian River Brewing
Style: Sour Ale
Santa Rosa, California USA

Sampled at C&P Otown Throwdown, big thanks to whoever brought this! Cloudy brown pour. Slightly sour candy (cabbage patch kids?), oak vanilla dark fruit aroma. Taste is tangy sour tart brett vinegar and oak. Not my fave style, but you can tell this was a very well done beer.

Fizzy red wine vinegar. The appearance was beautiful but the taste was awful. If I want wine I’ll buy wine.

Courtesy hopscotch. I’ve anticipated this beer’s release for about a year now. The pour yields a cloudy, glowing, rusty sienna colored body with a lasting, pillowy, cream colored head. Minimal, spotty lacing shows on the glass. Aromas include a dark, fruity malt base rich with currants and some sour cherry. Dry cocoa adds a hint of sweetness, while soft, oaky vanilla lends a perfumy, lightly woody overtone. Traces of bretty funk add an earthy character. Flavors show more dark fruits, primarily tart dark cherry, fig, and currant, mild sourness being tempered by the soft, oaky carress. The body is substantial and semi-dry, perfectly carbonated, but lacking that funky tart finish that sets other Russian River beers apart. It’s insane to call a beer that I rated 4.0 a letdown, but it almost is as my expectations were really through the roof. It definitely feels like it will benefit exponentially from some bottle aging, sourness and dryness improving with time. Good now, but probably great in a year. Give it a while.

Poured golden orange, CO2, tart fruits, funky, earthy hops, dark fruits, little malts, little bready.

Bottle shared at Capones. Pours a deep brownish amber with a small bubbly off white head. Aroma of various fruits, tart cherry, currants, sour and funky with some floral notes. Flavor of currants, sour and horsey notes, some cherry and bready. I just had this on tap at Local 44 and have to increase my rating numbers. I was getting most of the same as I got out of the bottle, just seemed more intense and flavorful off the tap lines!

8oz Snifter – Eastside Club Tavern – Olympia, WA
Aroma: Great sour aroma that adds to the excitement to try this nectar.
Appearance: Dark Amber in color, clear with a thin head.
Flavor: Tart flavor from the start to the finish with a great explosion of fruit flavors through out. This was a very well brewed beer.
Palate: Deep Dry finish, fruit flavor even in the finish and Mouthfeel.
Overall: Huge sour beer this was treat to try glad I got a glass and will savor this for along time.

750, corked and baled. Pours a crystal clear but staggeringly dark ruby red--almost black, way beyond burgundy. Dense, tightly foamy off-white head that lasts and lasts past several sips. Gorgeous right around.
Big sour nose. Got that lacto balsamic thwack as soon as you pull the cork, and definitely lights up your sinuses when you get your nose in the glass. I’m guessing there’s a currant thing happening, not that I can remember smelling a currant. But somewhere between a berry-skin tannic note and a bit of dark pitted tree fruit, there’s a sweet, fruity note complementing the lacto. Nicely combined.
The body’s clean and tight, lower than medium, maybe, and very little carb. Refreshing like fruit juice, especially when cool. If this weren’t the incredible beer that it is, something that tasted exactly like it would probably be widely popular as a mixer for cocktails. So, yeah, it’s not crazy sharply tart--mixed well, lots of people would drink a cocktail that contained one or two parts of something like this. Not sure where this metaphor’s going, so let’s just cut it off here.
The mid-palate is rather less complex than some of the RR sours, which of course gives it plenty of room to operate. Lacto/balsamic, dark berry skins, dark pitted tree fruit, some dense oak notes. This is a very pleasant and drinkable sour all the way through for sure.