199: Alex Flores of Urban South Kettle-Sours the Hard Way
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Kettle sours get a bad rap in some brewing circles, but Urban South\\u2019s Alex Flores would love to change your mind. Recalibrating and considering these beers as their own thing\\u2014rather than some faster approximation of other sour traditions\\u2014and you just might see the in a new light.
\\n\\nThey\\u2019ve definitely grown on the fans of Urban South, who\\u2019ve fallen hard for the tart beers. The brewery has nurtured a range of beers within the broader family. On one end, beers such as Cucumber Lime Gose strike a crisp and refreshing pose with light salinity, freshly juiced cucumber, and subtle tartness. On the other, heavily fruited beers thick with pur\\xe9e scratch that fruit-smoothie itch. Adjacent to those are more creative expressions, such as the Drip line of fruited coffee sours. Urban South is committed to exploring this particular expression of acid and fruit in beer.
\\n\\nIn this episode, Flores discusses:
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- The importance of vigorous lactic fermentations for better-tasting beer \\n
- Avoiding hop cross-contamination in the kettle \\n
- Controlling oxygen when kettle souring \\n
- Managing water and salinity in delicate tart beers \\n
- Dialing in sweetness to highlight fruit flavors \\n
- Homogenizing flavors through the mash, souring, boil, and fermentation \\n
- Adjusting and tweaking flavors \\n
- Processes for getting punchy natural fruit and vegetable expression \\n
- Blending whole bean and ground coffee in beer additions for better results \\n
And more.
\\n\\nIn Flores\\u2019 words, \\u201cYou can\\u2019t kettle-sour your way into a Cuv\\xe9e de Tomme,\\u201d but that\\u2019s not the point\\u2014they shouldn\\u2019t be viewed as contemporaries with traditional, funk-forward mixed-fermentation beers. When approached with the right frame of mind, and a buttoned-up process, brewers can make exciting beers that customers love.
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