Last year, the Felons crew celebrated International Margarita Day (Feb 22) by brewing a margarita sour made with tequila. This year, they wanted to make another one where the spirit shone through a little more. And so they partnered with Madre Mezcal, using their Ensamble to make the aptly named Margarita Sour Ale.*
As head brewer Tom Champion says of this new iteration: “The earthy flavour of Madre shines through the sour beer base without dominating… and the hint of char combined with subtle salinity rounds out the finish…”
But Tom. Not all of us sat around dissecting the flavours until they got the balance of mezcal to lime to salt to sourness just so. Do you know how us non-brewers (read: normal people) drink a margarita?
“Hey! Limey! Sour! Salty! Boozy! Goes great with my taco! Una mas!”
And so while we respect the craft of those who made the mezcal, and the skill of those who made the beer… we’re not going to use four-syllable words when we’re talking about the taste of this beer.
Except maybe: "margarita".
Mick Wüst
*A crash course on mezcal vs tequila: all tequilas are mezcals, but not all mezcals are tequilas. While most tequilas are made by large commercial operations and tend to focus on being smooth (similar to the way macro lagers focus on being easy-drinking), many other mezcals are small batch and bring nuanced, variable, and often more potent flavours. It all depends on the producer, their methods (often passed down through their family for generations), and the kind of agave they use to make the spirit. Highly recommend the book The Mezcal Experience by Tom Bullock if you want to dig into mezcal.
Published February 18, 2024 2024-02-18 00:00:00
