Have you ever seen a baby taste a lemon for the first time? (Youtube is full of these videos.) That’s what many people look like when they try their first sour beer. It’s a shocking and confusing experience - “Is this beer supposed to taste like this?!”

The answer is yes - there's a huge category of beers that are supposed to taste sour.

These beers aren’t for everyone. But for those who enjoy squeezing extra lime over their Mexican food; for those who love the lively acidity of vinegar with their chips or salad; for those who grew up eating sour gummi lollies and handfuls of tart berries… bring on the sour. 

What makes it a sour beer?

Beer is all about microorganisms; those tiny bugs and beasts make a huge difference in how things taste. Yeast is crucial in the brewing process to produce alcohol and carbon dioxide - this happens in all beer. But other microorganisms, such as lactobacillus bacteria, produce acid; if these are present in a beer, the beer will have a sour taste.

Through beer’s history, these sour flavours have gone from inevitable, to undesirable, to intentional. Before people understood how bacteria worked, sourness was a standard part of beer’s flavour. But the invention of pasteurisation in the mid-1800s helped people protect food and drink from bacteria in a new way. There was now a way to consistently produce non-sour beer. 

For the next century and a bit, if a beer in England, America or Australia had a sour flavour, something had gone wrong in the process. But with the rise of the modern craft movement, beer lovers rediscovered that sour could be desirable, largely from places like Belgium and Germany where some sour beers never went out of fashion. And so began the sour beer renaissance.

Back to microorganisms. In the past century and a half, brewing has become all about control and consistency in what little bugs you let into your beer, how you make them do what you want, and what little bugs you keep out of your beer.

Most sour beer is still made in a very controlled way - the brewer introduces specific bacteria into their beer in a certain way, keeps track of what the bacteria are doing and how the beer is changing, then shuts down the souring process when they’ve got the result they want. 

But if you see the words ‘wild’ or ‘spontaneous’, it means this beer was fermented with less control: the brewer allowed the microorganisms from a certain location into their beer to do what they want to do, and hoped for the best. (Though of course, these brewers have the expertise to make excellent beer this way.) 

What should I expect?

When you’re introduced to sour beer for the first time, it’s a strange concept. There’s an element of, ‘You’ve got to see it to believe it’… or perhaps in this case, ‘You’ve got to taste it to believe it.’

And so I could explain to you the range of flavours in the sour beer world, and how beers can be sour, tart or acidic depending on the brewing process; the way that various fruits and flowers are added to either enhance or balance the sourness; the way that some beers focus on the face-puckering and saliva-producing intense sourness, while other beers use sourness as a subtle flavour to boost the refreshment level up to eleven…

…but you’ll still be surprised when you try your first sour beer. So just like a baby with a lemon, open your mouth, have a big brave taste, and prepare to make some funny faces. 

What are some sour beers I could try?

Want a gentle introduction to sour beer? Try Yulli’s Dolly Aldrin Berliner Weisse. It’s light and dry; it’s tart up front, but rounded out with honeydew melon; it pairs well with salty potato gems. 

If you want to stick with more familiar hop flavours for now, get into Wolf of the Willows’ Pacific Sour for those juicy tropical tropical flavours with a soft acidity to cut through your thirst.

Aether Brewing will take you on a tasting adventure with their Summer of Sour beers, from Passionfruit & Earl Grey, to Lavender & Honey, to Ironbark Smoked Apricot.

Ready to keep exploring? Dad & Dave’s Brewing have an Oak and Whiskey Sour that’ll make you feel sophisticated, Six String’s Pinoy Fiesta blends the salty tang of a German gose style beer with a hit of pineapple juice, while The Rubinstein from Urban Alley will give you a glimpse into a more traditional Belgian style sour