Herevana – McLeod’s – Smugglers Bay Black Sour Ale 2020
McLeods Smugglers Bay Black Sour Ale 2020. I’ve been getting through some very good beers and am down to a couple that I’ve been looking forward to with some anticipation, and give them the attention they deserve,
The first one is the Back Sour ale, which I hope is going to be in the same vein as a Flanders Reds perhaps, I mean it’s been in Pinot Barrels
McLeod’s Brewery made the McLeod’s Smugglers Bay Black Sour Ale 2020- in 🇳🇿 Waipu, New Zealand, and it is a Sour / Wild Beer – Dark with an ABV of 7.5% – this is 3 standard drink units in NZ
Bottle 740 of 2,000 available at the time. There’s probably a few around. I go mine at the local Liquorland, but all good place should have them.
oh I’m not disappointed with hat aroma on opening – glorious sour ale, the proper kind of sour ale.
The pour is indeed black, like a stout, but it clearly isn’t from the aroma that you get in spades during th pour and in the glass.
This barrel aged oakiness in this bring that woody familiarity, keeping this beer from leaping our and being something else, This is, for me, very much like a Flanders Sour/Red but it’s not. And I’ll tell you why not, it’s that barrel aged thing.
This has ended in the middle of two things, a weird magic zone where it lives its own thing. I really like that oakiness/barrel thing it adds a really nice level or layer where things are going on either side, independently but tied together by it.
I can tell you that as it warms, it just gets more outstanding and that fruit Pinot note pushed through, this is lovely. I should do myself a favour and. get me another one.
I’m listening to Sad Songs for Dirty Lovers by The National on the Spotify,
The Pdubyah-o-meter rates this as 9 on the arbitrary number scale. It is by many measures a remarkable beer, It is complex and has a lot to discover, it’s also quite simple and really easy to enjoy without it taking you off the beaten track and into unfamiliar places, it is a work of magic.
Despite its simplistic name, Black Sour 2020 is complex to the core. A blend of several vintages of sour beers from our barrel program, the majority of aging barrels used are former Marlborough Pinot Noir barriques which shaped the foundation of this unique beer. Layers of sour dark fruits & chocolate are evident alongside nuances of pinot soaked oak & a bright lemon finish. Incredibly layered & so drinkable now, but perfect for the cellar
Herevana beers are those I drink at home, I’m not at some beer festival, like, for instance, Beervana, but am just in my kitchen, usually, dining room table, sometimes, or outside, occasionally, where I can take an average picture and write in real time about the beer that I’ve invested in, both in a monetary and emotional way.
Philip himself.
A life just as ordinary 