Russian River Depuration

Formerly brewed at Russian River Brewing
Style: Sour Ale
Santa Rosa, California USA

(375ml bottle) Pours a lightly hazy golden body with a moderate white head. Aroma of sour grapes, brett, mustiness, earthiness, and oak. Flavor of sour funkiness subdued in the finish with oak characteristics.

Wow. This was very interesting. Clear amber pour with fine carbonation. Smells like a white wine that has tons of lactic acid... very creamy and buttery smell, yet it is still sour and funky. Smells like sour citrus, grapes, oak, vanilla. Flavor is also fantastic. It is pretty funky and sour, but finishes very smooth and creamy (both in flavor and in mouthfeel). Another great beer by Vinnie!

A big thanks to cquiroga for bringing this beer to the Woodshop tasting at Stuffed Sandwich in San Gabriel, CA. It poured a clear golden color. The flavor was dry & tart

I’m surprised and impressed with this beer. It is very winelike and tart. The grapes are strong in the aroma. Citurs, organge peel, lemon zest and very spicy overall. It is sour, but not bitingly so - pleasantly tart, if you will. It is a well-balanced, good sipping beer.beer. Slightly cloudy/hazy yellow in color with no head. A little malty in the aroma, as well as strongly cellared and musty.

Bottle. Pours a cloudy yellow body with a white soapy head. Very dry, vinegar-like aroma with apple skins and other vinous notes. Complex flavour profile that is seemingly well-balanced - some doughiness and dry fruits up front leading into some mild sweetness. Finishes dry and spritzy. Very solid.
Sampled at the Pizza Port 12 Hour Belgian Beer Party from some random bottle on March 24, 2007.

Batch 001, Sampled March 2007
Pours with a touch of haze and a copper to deep gold color. It is topped by a frothy, fizzy almost champagne-like head, that has more staying power than champagne, but still disappears to a thin coating across the top of the beer after peaking at about two-fingers in thickness. As I pour this I get a nice, dry, sauvignon Blanc like fruitiness as well as a bit of steely tartness. When I go in for a deeper draught of the aroma the oak becomes much more apparent; buttery oak, vanillin and a spicy woodiness are all quite noticeable in the nose. The oak actually tends to mask some of the initial fruit notes that I had noticed while pouring this brew. I wish there was a touch less oak and more of the other notes. Hopefully Vinnie will reuse these same barrels for another batch, which should have less oak influence.

The taste is pleasingly tart up front, and in fact that bit of acidity follows the flavor profile throughout. At first the oak is not as noticeable as in the nose. Again a soft sort of Sauvignon Blanc type fruitiness and character comes through in the flavor too. Actually the oak flavors never seem to be as dominant as the corresponding aromatics; soft notes of butter, spicy oak, a woody astringency, and some vanillin are noticeable but add to the over all experience here instead of dominating it. As the beer warms up it begins to pick up some soft sweetness, it is still quite dry seeming but a touch of grape like sweetness helps to balance things out even further. A touch of flinty, steely flavors are found in the finish and the couple pretty well with the lingering, light acidity. This beer is not extremely light in the mouthfeel department; I think both the oak and a touch of residual sweetness add a bit more body here that one might expect at first blush, still this is fairly light and definitely quaffable.

This beer is growing on my as I work my way through it; maybe it is my palate but it seems to be getting a bit more balanced as time goes on. I still think that a 375ml bottle is too small for a beer like this, but I could always crack open another bottle. While this beer is certainly wine-like in its flavors, I would not necessarily guess that it definitively had grapes in it; the grapes character, while certainly contributing here, have largely been fermented out and subsumed within the barrel aging process. I’ll be interested to see how this batch ages.

Bottle shared by awaisanen, thanks Andy. Pours a hazy golden amber, with a diminishing effervescent white head. Aroma is of dry, champagne like grapes, sour green apple, and sweet notes. Flavor is similar, but may be a little too sweet. Palate is medium bodied, and could benefit from some time to let the brett do it’s thing.

From a 375mL Bottle. Slightly hazy, light golden rod colored pour with a small layer of smokey white head. Aroma of sauvingnon blanc grapes, gentle floral lavendar, and a light confectioner’s sugar adds some sweetness to the tart, vinous bouquet. I’m almost getting a hint of coconut character as well. Light to medium bodied, sparkling mouthfeel. Some tingling, funky oakiness starts out the flavors, along with more white grape skin tannins. It has a great flavor, I just wish it were a bit drier. Sour, but not overly tart. The flavors are a bit drier than the nose, but its still a bit too much on the sweet side for me. Some dusty, funky lemon notes linger in the final smack.