So I couldn't make it to the this summer's Upland Sour Fest, but thankfully a good friend of mine could. Katie Gilmore is a local beer enthusiast and home brewer for the Evanston Avenue Brewery with her husband.
My husband and I recently went to the first Upland Sour Wild
Funk Fest at Developer Town in SoBro. We live nearby, so we rode our bikes to
the event. This turned out to be a wise move since there was plenty of beer to
go around.
The premise of the event was to offer samples of sour beers
along with food pairings. The idea of food pairings drew me to this event,
since previously, I preferred my sours as part of a 3 ounce tasting flight at
Twenty Tap. I liked to sample the different varieties, but sours didn’t strike
me as something to sip on while catching up with friends.
Upland’s executive chef, Seth Elgar, put together the food
pairings for the Sour Fest. The event was set up so that the program listed the
sours available for tasting, and next to each sour, it listed the suggested
food pairing. This was very helpful as we made our way through the event.
The food was set up buffet style (with a hilarious sign that
read, “This isn’t Golden Corral”). It was easy to grab a little bit of each
item to try with the beers as we visited each tasting booth. I waited about an
hour to get any food because the room was very warm. But after we had a few
samples, it was time to eat.
As for the pairings, I think the heat had a lot to do with
my interpretation of whether or not I liked a pairing. (This is obvious when
you see that I basically liked the fruit pairings and not the meat or heavy
cheese, which I typically enjoy.) For example, the Petrus Dubbel Bruin with
capocolla seemed too heavy for me to appreciate. But the Bell’s Oarsman with
cantaloupe was excellent. Since we’re headed into summer, it’s probably just as
well that I know what works for me in the heat. Some of my favorite pairings
were:
- · Bell’s Oarsman with cantaloupe (contrast)
- · Goose Island Juliet with brie (complement)
- · Goose Island Lolita with honeydew (contrast)
- · Barley Island Old Helen II with mini chocolate cheesecake (body)
- · Upland Blackberry Lambic with blackberries (complement)
- · New Belgium La Folie with white grapes (complement)
Not to detract from the other great beers that I sampled,
here’s a list of the other sours I enjoyed as a stand-alone:
- · Sun King Sour Princess
- · Brugge Pooka
- · New Belgium Biere de Mars
- · Mad Anthony Ruby Raspberry Tart
- · Upland Gilgamesh Imperial Flanders-Style Red Ale
I would recommend this event to anyone who, like me, has
appreciated a small serving of a sour here and there, but maybe hasn’t had the
chance to really get to know all of the varieties that are available. I also
appreciated the way that Upland approached this event. Tickets were limited,
and they did a good job on the logistics of the space relative to the crowd
size. We were at the event from 2 p.m. until 5-ish, and I don’t think we waited
more than 2-3 minutes for a tasting at any of the booths.
I hope you’ve found this to be helpful!
