THE FAKE SOURS.. CORRUPTION IN BREWING

[Owly055]

I'm no longer brewing beer, though I brew other things including vinegar, some wine, some things we are not allowed to discuss here, as well as kombucha and kefir. I also work closely with a neighbor in his brewing, having gotten him started a number of years ago.
Recently I was delighted to find a sour from a local micro on tap..... Something about it was not quite right to my palette, so I did a bit of research and discovered that it was FAKE...... it was not really a legitimate sour, but was given it's sour flavor by adding citric (I think) acid.
I am hardly wedded to convention in brewing, so my standing to challenge this is questionable at best, but I consider this completely dishonest!

I draw the line at corrupt brewing!! This is serious business and such brewers MUST be outed and boycotted. I will be notifying those brewers I discover to be using such strategies that I will never drink ANY OF YOUR PRODUCTS AGAIN..... AND I will spread the word that you are a dishonest and corrupt brewer. Any such

H.W.

 

[brownni5]

Ok.

 

[schematix]

you can't make a post like that and not name names

 

[bob1852]

Are kettle sours 'legitimate'?

 

[bkboiler]

Agreed...
makes me wonder if all these beers calling themselves juicy don't just have juice in them, technically it would be accurate marketing...

 

[radwizard]

Perhaps you have been brewing a little to much of what we cannot discuss here....

 

[Brooothru]

Although I'm not particularly fond of sours per se, in the last year or so I have tried two 'sour-ish' beers that I found reasonably tasty. The first one was at Dogfishead brewery in Delaware called "Sea Quench" which I believe they said was a kettle sour brewed with sea salt and some 'exotic' lime. Not too shabby as a summer sipper, even for someone who's not enamored of sours.

The other beer was from Flying Dog called "Salty *****" which I had at a five course culinary cooking with beer class last month. I believe they described it as a Berliner Weiss brewed with sea salt and citrus zest from some equally 'exotic' lemon or blood orange. I actually liked it better than the Sea Quench, but mostly I liked it as the primary liquid addition to the cookies we made with it. Absolutely amazing. Already done the cookie recipe twice!

Hope neither of these beers (from reputable breweries) are the ones that sparked the OP's ire.

Brooo Brother (aka, "Destroyer of Cookies")

 

[Hwk-I-St8]

Meh - there's more than one way to get a sour beer, each with it's own flavor elements. I'm not married to any particular approach anymore than I am to any particular style of IPA or stout. They're just different styles of beer. Who am I to say one or another is "fake"?

I know some serious sour aficionados who say kettle sours aren't "real" sours. They turn their nose up at a Berliner Weisse. They're welcome to their opinion, but I prefer to taste and experience different beers with an open mind.

The LAST thing I want is all beers to be the same.

 

[Jayjay1976]

Adding citric acid to beer in order to give it a sour flavor is nothing new. Radler, russ, shandy, etc. It's a way to add flavor and make the beer more refreshing. Nothing "fake" about it. If you can't handle it, just don't buy it. Just because you disapprove doesn't give you right or reason to trash someone's brewery. Is it the lack of microbes you can't deal with? They're just a means to an end. Take kettle sours for example, are those fake sours?

 

[lump42]

It's not any worse than 'slushy' berliner weisse (*cough* 450North *cough) Those seem to be selling well, so the Instagrams and Facebooks would show.

 

[RPh_Guy]

I know some serious sour aficionados who say kettle sours aren't "real" sours. They turn their nose up at a Berliner Weisse.

The thing is, there's no reason to kettle sour a Berliner Weisse. Kettle souring is an unnecessarily complicated process and it produces a less flavorful product.

Kettle souring is like lagering a hefeweizen (and using a lager pitch rate) -- in other words, using an unnecessary complicated process which removes desirable flavor components in the process. No brewery would ever do this because it makes zero sense. I'm not sure why this is deemed "acceptable" when making sour beer.

Adding straight acid would be like brewing a 1% ABV beer and then adding vodka to get to 6% ABV. Is this a product you would buy because you're tired of beers all being the same?

 

[Cavpilot2000]

I had a sour a few weeks ago at my local HB club meeting that would have been a decent Berliner Weiß, except that it was supposed to be a west coast IPA! [emoji23]

Obviously something went horribly wrong.

 

[bob1852]

The thing is, there's no reason to kettle sour a Berliner Weisse. Kettle souring is an unnecessarily complicated process and it produces a less flavorful product.

I don't believe he meant kettle souring a Berliner. I think he meant kettle sours and Berliner are two types of sours that the OP may not consider "legitimate"...

 

[RPh_Guy]

I don't believe he meant kettle souring a Berliner. I think he meant kettle sours and Berliner are two types of sours that the OP may not consider "legitimate"...

I'm struggling to imagine a "serious sour aficionado" turning his nose up at a mixed fermentation Berliner. BJCP even allows for "restrained" Brett funk in this style.

It's different if it's a kettle sour with an equal part unfermented fruit juice and a generous helping of lactose (i.e. "alcopop"). Many people like those and that's fine too. I'm not here to argue about what's "legitimate", because it's all good as long as somebody enjoys drinking it, IMO.

For the record I completely disagree with the OP.

 

[Hwk-I-St8]

The thing is, there's no reason to kettle sour a Berliner Weisse. Kettle souring is an unnecessarily complicated process and it produces a less flavorful product.

Kettle souring is like lagering a hefeweizen (and using a lager pitch rate) -- in other words, using an unnecessary complicated process which removes desirable flavor components in the process. No brewery would ever do this because it makes zero sense. I'm not sure why this is deemed "acceptable" when making sour beer.

Adding straight acid would be like brewing a 1% ABV beer and then adding vodka to get to 6% ABV. Is this a product you would buy because you're tired of beers all being the same?

If I like the flavor....yes. Your question is like the one where someone asks "what would you do if someone served you meat that you really liked and then told you it was bat meat?". My response is that I'd then know I like bat.

 

[Hwk-I-St8]

I don't believe he meant kettle souring a Berliner. I think he meant kettle sours and Berliner are two types of sours that the OP may not consider "legitimate"...

Yup

 

[Miraculix]

I'm struggling to imagine a "serious sour aficionado" turning his nose up at a mixed fermentation Berliner. BJCP even allows for "restrained" Brett funk in this style.

It's different if it's a kettle sour with an equal part unfermented fruit juice and a generous helping of lactose (i.e. "alcopop"). Many people like those and that's fine too. I'm not here to argue about what's "legitimate", because it's all good as long as somebody enjoys drinking it, IMO.

For the record I completely disagree with the OP.

I'm sure the guys from Berlin really care about what the bjcp says about Berliner Weisse

 

[archthered]

I sympathize with your anger at feeling cheated, especially if they used deceptive advertising like saying they only used microbes to sour, but I feel like your issues open up more problems than it solves. Like this

Are kettle sours 'legitimate'?

Where do you draw this line between "real" and "fake"? Is it fake to add a acid to your sour to your sour in order to drop the pH into the range your strain of bugs like to start at? Is it fake to add acid to a non-sour to get your pH where you want it?

This is very true-

Adding citric acid to beer in order to give it a sour flavor is nothing new. Radler, russ, shandy, etc. It's a way to add flavor and make the beer more refreshing. Nothing "fake" about it. If you can't handle it, just don't buy it. Just because you disapprove doesn't give you right or reason to trash someone's brewery. Is it the lack of microbes you can't deal with? They're just a means to an end. Take kettle sours for example, are those fake sours?

This is nothing new and has been around for a long time. If you don't like what they do that is fine, you don't have to like every breweries beer, there's nothing wrong with that, you can even not like beer brewed in a certain way, for example sours made primarily by adding citric acid, that is just fine. But to say it's "fake" forces your view of what beer can and should be on everyone else, it's close minded about beer and has the distinct odor of beer snobbery. Let people like what they like, you are welcome to disagree, taste is incredibly subjective, but I feel like following your argument to it's conclusion and applying it to beer in general is horrifically problematic.

But just to be clear if you feel like they advertised one thing but did something else your anger is justified but should be at the deception, not the brewing process.

 

[RPh_Guy]

If I like the flavor....yes. Your question is like the one where someone asks "what would you do if someone served you meat that you really liked and then told you it was bat meat?". My response is that I'd then know I like bat.

I completely agree. It's flavor/enjoyment that matters!

I'm sure the guys from Berlin really care about what the bjcp says about Berliner Weisse

Completely agree (that they don't care).
My point is that beers labeled "Berliner Weisse" in the US are often very different from German Berliner Weisse, historical or current (or even some more traditional examples in the US). That makes it unwise to prejudice all beers labeled as a Berliner.

 

[cactusgarrett]

To me, "fake" = a simple berliner or gose (that's not an import) that has it's price intentionally jacked up to deceive, like it's an aged sour with bugs. No reason to jack up the price since it's not requiring a larger(er) footprint or long(er) timeframe than more standard, clean beers in the brewhaus. Only point of that "fakeness" is to deceive the consumer and get more money.

 

[Jayjay1976]

All the pearl clutching over what is/isn't "authentic" beer is tiresome.

 

[bernardsmith]

Sounds very much like cheese makers who argue about whether a mozzarella cheese must be made using cultures or whether you may legitimately curdle the milk by adding lemon juice or citric acid. Trouble is that both methods make mozzarella. They taste different and the cultured method takes considerably longer to make. But cheese makers don't argue over this. They simply choose the method they prefer to make the cheese they enjoy. To each his ...or her own ...

 

[brownni5]

To me, "fake" = a simple berliner or gose (that's not an import) that has it's price intentionally jacked up to deceive, like it's an aged sour with bugs. No reason to jack up the price since it's not requiring a larger(er) footprint or long(er) timeframe than more standard, clean beers in the brewhaus. Only point of that "fakeness" is to deceive the consumer and get more money.

I hear this argument a lot, and I get it, but shouldn't the market determine what the price point is? That is, is someone willing to pay $12 for a kettle sour? I'm not, but there are those who are. If it's not hurting them and the brewer is making their profit that way, then more power to them.

I suppose who it's hurting is the more traditional long-term sour producers: the Jolly Pumpkins and Rare Barrels and Side Projects if the world, but if they wanted to cash in on the kettle sour train, that's certainly an option for them (I for one hope they don't go this route).

 

[cactusgarrett]

shouldn't the market determine what the price point is? That is, is someone willing to pay $12 for a kettle sour? I'm not, but there are those who are. If it's not hurting them and the brewer is making their profit that way, then more power to them.

I agree, but bringing this full-circle, i think this is why people are getting outraged or "fake outraged" - they're attempting (in a way) to educate people who can't tell the difference and that it isn't necessary to have the prices that high, in the same way it's necessary for a bug-sour brewery to have higher prices (to balance storage space, barrel maintenance, etc.).

 

[brownni5]

I agree, but bringing this full-circle, i think this is why people are getting outraged or "fake outraged" - they're attempting (in a way) to educate people who can't tell the difference and that it isn't necessary to have the prices that high, in the same way it's necessary for a bug-sour brewery to have higher prices (to balance storage space, barrel maintenance, etc.).

Oh, I'm sure it is. I guess what I'm saying is there really isn't a reason for anyone to get upset about it - it's just beer. Yes, it is cheaper to produce a kettle-soured beer compared to a barrel-aged sour, which takes up a lot of space and has a better than fair chance at getting dumped, but until the market says "that's too much," then they could conceivably charge more.

 

[Jayjay1976]

Has OP even come back to check on the pot he stirred up? Corrupt brewing. Sheesh. Fake sours? More like fake outrage.
We've been trolled I tellya. Seems to be a lot of that going around lately...

 

[bkboiler]

Sounds like he can confidently state "Ich Bin Ein Berliner" (google it)