Being the adventurous souls that we are, we are charging on with our quest into the week of sours. At times there have been challenges but for the most part I think it is fair to say we have been surprised by some of what we have found. Will Lucy's Juices get our juices flowing in return, well... read on to find out, yeah?
Brewery
Play Brew Company
Name
Juicy Lucy
Style
Blackcurrant, Blueberry & Strawberry Triple Fruited Sour
ABV
6.0%
Jack
For some reason this can design really did it for me, and that caused me to fall into the trap of thinking that meant the beer inside was going to be amazing. The thing is, it was probably pretty good, but there is this thing I get with fruited sours, perhaps from the interplay of the lactose, the mouth feel and the fruitiness, where I recognise a flavour and don't know what it is. That's what I got here. But more of that later.
There are definite Berliner Weisse vibes with this beer with blackcurrant being the overriding taste you're likely to identify straight off. However, there was a slightly perceptible soupcon of strawberry on the after taste. Unsurprisingly, the taste of blueberry was not to be found - aside from Bianca by Omnipollo, show me a blueberry sour that actually tastes of blueberries and I will thank you most heartily.
The sourness here is a little flabby - my notes say pillowy but I'm not sure I have come across a pillowy sour note before so I have no idea what that means. Suffice it to say, this isn't a spiky, enamel stripping sour, more of a warming sour. I would have like this beer a lot more, were it not for this nagging thing in the back of my mind.
Before I hand over to my good friend, who has been called the Clark Kent of the craft beer community, I should reveal what I think the overriding flavour is. For me, this tastes pretty much exactly like rice pudding with jam, just like nanny used to make. For that reason, I think it is hard for me to rate this too highly, but if you're into blackcurrants, you'll probably love this. For me, its just good, not great.
Score - 3.75
Dan
I would definitely agree with Jackie boy, who has been called the Bruce Banner of the craft beer community stemming from some particularly rambunctious nights in the tappy, that there is something oh so inviting about this can design. A sort of kitsch amalgamation of quirky retro meets cartoon!!
The liquid inside was unfortunately a little less enamouring...
This was by no means a bad beer and I agree with Jack that blackcurrant was certainly the presiding flavour, like a boozy fizzy Ribena that had a sachet of tart sherbet added to the mix. I got no more than an apparition of blueberry and strawberry but that's ok, I can certainly make do with blackcurrant and I have to admit, so far it sounds pretty decent right?
The issue - there was just an odd mouthfeel/taste that I reckon I could place but really shouldn't have been there!! The texture and back-end on this was simply put, rather soapy, as if, your little cousin had been in charge of the washing up immediately before pouring the cordials and hadn't properly washed out the Fairy liquid. It left a sort of astringent, frothy bitterness across the palate that tasted unnatural and sadly marred the otherwise pretty spiffy Blacky C flavours!
I want to caveat the above by saying that I had this immediately after the Makemake Cherry Pie dessert sour (review of which is incoming tomorrow) and I think it is always difficult transitioning from a thicker, more heavily fruited sour to something intended to be slightly crisper, lighter and refreshing (and generally less dessert-like) as I suspect was the intention with this berliner weisse.
For that reason, I wouldn't black-list this beer from a second try and more importantly, I will actively be looking out for more stuff from Play Brew co as whilst this didn't set my world alight, I have certainly seen enough to know that these lot are packing potential!!
Dan - 3.75
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