10 best sour beers: The craft brews to taste right now

by Amy Sedghi Jul 09, 2021 7 minutes

Love or hate the tartness, sour beers are gaining in popularity worldwide.

"Sour beers have, and continue to enjoy, enduring popularity within the craft beer world given the diversity within the style,” explains Adam Black from online craft beer retailer, HonestBrew. “Simply put, it’s a style of beer that brewers can have a lot of fun making.”

Some have called sour beers the “oldest type of beer in history”, given that before pasteurisation and sterilisation became the norm, most beers were sour to some degree.

Nowadays though, wild bacteria and yeasts, which produce acids, lend sour beers their tartness. “From gose to berliner weisse and lambics, there are a variety of styles within the sour beer category,” adds Black. “With each having their own individual spin.”

Sours are certainly an acquired taste, and although they may not be everyone’s cup of tea, there are a vast array of options out there to try. From those that’ll make your face pucker to those that are light, refreshing and more on the zesty side of sour.

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Ingredients can be varied too: in our taste test for this round-up we tried drinks incorporating peach, gooseberry, licorice, tea, preserved lemons and yoghurt to name a few. It’s certainly worth trying a few different sour beers to see which tickles the taste buds – not to mention that they can be a great refreshing option on warm summer days and something a little different.

In our bid to find the best sour beers to sip this summer, we’ve cracked open numerous cans and bottles of the sour brews, making note of the appearance, scent, flavour and finish.

Hopefully there’s a choice here for every sour beer drinker, whether you like yours with a punch of acidity and a high percentage, or like something a little more subtle. Remember, if the first you try doesn’t do it for you, it’s worth giving another sour a try.

These are the best sour beers for 2021:

Best overall – Brick Brewery guava sour, 3.9%: £3.00, Hopburnsblack.co.uk
Best gose-style sour beer – North Brewing Co. triple fruited gose tayberry sour, 4.5%: £5.80, Weebeershop.co.uk
Best vegan sour beer – Wild Beer Co. sleeping lemons, 3.6%: £2.49, Wildbeerco.com
Best pastry sour – Howling Hops hit or miss rhubarb pastry sour, 4.6%: £4.40, Store.claptoncraft.co.uk
Best alcohol-free sour beer – Big Drop Brewing Co. rush rider pastry sour, 0.5%: £2.99, Thealcoholfreeco.co.uk
Best for easy drinking – Bird & Blend Tea Co strawberry lemonade fruit tea sour beer, 3.9%: £4.50, Birdandblendtea.com
Best for packing a punch – Track Brewing Co. freedom of choice raspberry sour, 7.2%: £7.50, Craftmetropolis.co.uk
Best for something a bit different – Orbit tzatziki sour Berliner Weisse, 4.3%: £26 for 12, Orbitbeers.shop
Best low alcohol sour beer – Pastore limone, 2.5%: £3.00, Cambridgewine.com
Best for an extra sour kick – Mikkeler passion pool, 4.6%: £6.40, Brewcavern.co.uk
Best if you’re new to sour beer – Brew York goose willis gooseberry fool sour, 5.3%: £39.75 for 12, Brewyork.co.uk

Brick Brewery guava sour 3.9%, 330ml

Best: Overall

While sour beers are well-loved and produced, in a number of countries worldwide, it’s exciting to see the number of innovative and fun sours being produced by UK breweries. Brick Brewery, a craft microbrewery in Peckham, certainly knows how to do sours well. Its offerings are always fun, refreshing and light enough that you can put away a pint or two easily.

Fermented with Brick’s house mixed culture, this sour ale contains pink guava puree which creates a delicious tropical taste. A hazy, golden yellow, the 3.9 per cent beer has a sourness that is satisfying but not overpowering. We loved its refreshing taste and fresh finish, plus the notes of melon and papaya that came across. Just pop a few cans of this in your fridge and your fresh, zesty summer drink of choice will be sorted.

Buy now £3.00, Hopburnsblack.co.uk

North Brewing Co. triple fruited gose tayberry sour 4.5%, 440ml

Best: Gose-style sour beer

Pouring like a berry smoothie, this rich and tasty sour from North Brewing Co’s triple fruited gose series is a delight. The star ingredient is a raspberry-blackberry hybrid from the Scottish Highlands called the tayberry, which the brewery describes as “raspberry, but more”. In fact, the brewery’s range of offerings in this series uses three times the amount of fruit that you would usually expect to find in a fruit sour.

Thicker in consistency than some of the other sour beers we tried, it’s a substantial, rich drink and one we couldn’t imagine putting away much of without feeling pretty full up fast. It’s crafted with oats, ale malt, salt, lactose and infused with the organic tayberry. That said, it was delicious and one we would pick off the shelf again and again. It also has just the right amount of sour tartness to get taste buds tingling and a tinge of sweetness that is not at all cloying. Its peach, brown sugar and cinnamon sour is worth a shout out too – it’s superbly blended with sweet notes that reminded us of a delicious fruity crumble.

Buy now £5.80, Weebeershop.co.uk

Wild Beer Co. sleeping lemons 3.6%, 330ml

Best: Vegan sour beer

If you like sucking that leftover lemon slice at the end of your drink, then pick a bottle of this up pronto. It may be called sleeping lemons, but it’s citrusy to the max, with an aroma of tart preserved lemons and a taste like traditional lemonade, but with a kick. Inspired by the Moroccan tradition of preserving lemons in salt, Wild Beer Co have crafted a gose-style wheat based beer with salt and coriander, but with an added lemony edge.

While the options for vegan beers generally are growing, sour beers can be a little tricky with so many using lactose in their brews. Wild Beer Co, which is based on a farm in rural Somerset, have a few vegan options to try: as well as the sleeping lemons, there’s also the fruitbooter with a mix of raspberry and pink peppercorn.

Buy now £2.49, Wildbeerco.com

Howling Hops hit or miss rhubarb pastry sour 4.6%, 440ml

Best: Pastry sour

It seems to us that rhubarb is a great flavour that lends itself to sour beers very well, so we were delighted with this pastry sour by Hackney brewers, Howling Hops. A summery peachy pink colour, it’s a cloudy refresher that’s almost too easy to drink. It packs a real zinger at the end of a sip and we liked its sweet yet tangy taste. This collaboration with the trendy DOH Bakery uses fresh rhubarb with lactose to create that sweet and sour combo. Simply crack open a can and you have summer right there (even if it is pouring down with rain outside).

Buy now £4.40, Claptoncraft.co.uk

Big Drop Brewing Co. rush rider pastry sour 0.5%, 440ml

Best: Alcohol-free sour beer

Multi-award winning alcohol-free brewers Big Drop have teamed up with the Oslo-based Amundsen Brewery to create this pastry sour that gives a slightly tangy taste sensation but without the hangover. Lightly fruity, it isn’t hugely sour or fizzy. Instead it’s on the sweeter side and is light enough to be able to drink very easily.

We thought the flavour profile, fresh vanilla, berries and peach pie, was quite gentle. And although we would have liked it cranked up a level, we do think it would be a good choice for sunny picnics or in the garden for those who don’t drink or are looking to slow down on the booze front. It’s also gluten-free and vegan.

Buy now £2.99, Thealcoholfreeco.co.uk

Bird & Blend Tea Co strawberry lemonade fruit tea sour beer 3.9%, 500ml

Best: For easy drinking

Like an iced tea, this strawberry lemonade fruit tea sour beer is light, refreshing and disappears easily on a hot summer’s day. Thanks to a collaboration between eco-conscious tea mixology company, Bird and Blend and microbrewers Basement Beer, this kettle sour mashes up the best of fruit tea, zesty sour beer and fresh lemonade.

Some might find it too watery, but for rising temperatures we think it’s a great option to have stored in a coolbox or fridge, ready for a chilled sip. It goes down very easily and tastes fresh. We enjoyed ours alongside an al fresco dinner and would certainly go back for more.

Buy now £4.50, Birdandblendtea.com

Track Brewing Co. freedom of choice raspberry sour 7.2%, 440ml

Best: For packing a punch

This cloudy raspberry pink sour, which is packed with fruit, looks as good as it tastes. With the Manchester based Track Brewing Co. describing the beer as, “the wonder child of a raspberry smoothie and raspberry compote”, we were excited to get our hands on it, and it didn’t disappoint.

The sourness, sharpness and smoothness from the vanilla, lactose, raspberry, strawberry and lemon are all beautifully balanced and at 7.2 per cent ABV, it packs a punch (although worryingly, you might not know it given how easily it goes down). We loved how the sour beer delivered tartness alongside a satisfying juiciness. It’s a real zinger, plus we think the artwork on Track’s cans are among the most stylish.

Buy now £7.50, Craftmetropolis.co.uk

Orbit tzatziki sour Berliner Weisse 4.3%, 330ml, pack of 12

Best: For something a bit different

Okay, okay, bear with us. We know a tzatziki sour beer sounds rather odd, and even if you’re a fan of the dip, you might be thinking “but, do I want to drink it?!” We were dubious too but then we popped the cap off and had a sip.

Orbit’s Berliner Weisse influenced kettle sour was inspired by head brewer, Paul’s, holidays to Brussels, Belgium and Symi in Greece, and we’re glad he had the creativity to dream it up. Including ingredients such as yoghurt, cucumber and mint, the sour beer really does mimic the taste of tzatziki, but with a zingy twist. Lightly carbonated, the drink is refreshing and smooth. We think it would be a fitting accompaniment to a crisp Greek salad or a warm souvlaki. Trust us, you’ll be pleasantly surprised by this unusual drink flavour.

Buy now £26.00, Orbitbeers.shop

Pastore limone 2.5%, 440ml

Best: Low alcohol sour beer

Sometimes you fancy a drink but need something without an eye-popping ABV, and we think this offering from Cambridge based brewers, Pastore is just the ticket. It looks like a fresh homemade lemonade and has a similar sherbet tang – although taken up a notch to get that sour hit. At 2.5 per cent it’s a nice, low-alcohol option and one that you could enjoy a few of on a sunny day.

The mixed culture beer is conditioned on Sicilian lemons (you can almost feel the warm breeze over the groves as you close your eyes), plus a small amount of pink grapefruit and mandarin oranges. We liked how the simple artwork on the can reflects the ethos of the beer: laidback, fresh and fuss-free. We’re ready to order a box of these to get us through the incoming heatwave we’ve been promised.

Buy now £3.00, Cambridgewine.com

Mikkeler passion pool 4.6%, 440ml

Best: For an extra sour kick

If you like your sours to be lip smacking, face twisting, eye squinting-ly tart then this is the one for you. Not for the faint hearted, Danish brewery Mikkeler’s passion fruit gose seemed to get more sour the more we drank it. It might look and smell like a breakfast juice when poured, with its deep yellow-orange hue, but you won’t want to get this mixed up with your morning OJ.

It’s a great one to sip and although not the lightest, it also didn’t feel as heavy or thick as some of the others we tried. We also loved the beautiful can covered in illustrations of swimmers, that left us wanting to dive right in.

Buy now £6.40, Brewcavern.co.uk

Brew York goose willis gooseberry fool sour 5.3%, 440ml, pack of 12

Best: If you’re new to sour beer

If you’re new to sour beer or trying to persuade someone who likes their craft pale ale to give sours a try, then we’d recommend Brew York’s gooseberry fool sour. It doesn’t have the funky scent or shocking tartness of some other sours, but it does boast a citrusy, fresh taste with a slight sweetness to it. We also thought that the smell was reminiscent of a favoured craft pale ale, which was no bad thing.

The gooseberry flavour is quite subtle, while the beer has a nice gentle tang to it. At 5.3 per cent, it’s actually stronger than you’d think drinking it, thanks to a smooth finish. We also love Brew York’s cheeky pun-focused names: as well as the “Goose Willis”, they also have a cherry pie pastry sour called “Kirsch Russell” and a Star Wars themed “Mos Eisley Catharina 2021” sour.

Buy now £39.75, Brewyork.co.uk

The verdict: Sour beers

One of the great things about sour beers is the varied range of styles and taste sensations out there. Brick Brewery’s guava sour is a great all-rounder that is perfectly refreshing for summer.

We also loved the rich and fruity flavour of the North Brewing Co. triple fruited gose tayberry sour and were impressed by Orbit’s tzatziki sour Berliner Weisse – an unusual flavour to sip on but surprisingly pleasant.

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