A Whale A Week: Jester King Nocturn Chrysalis

Now in my second year, A Whale A Week is my challenge to try (with an array of beer loving friends) a rare beer for every week of the year.  Last year I had a great time with this and have continued it for 2016.  Not every beer will be a truly "white whale" beer, but all are hard to find and a treat to try!  I've been kind of bad about keeping up on this the past few months--maybe I should rename this to A Whale Every Other Week...

Jester King Nocturn Chrysalis Blend 2

Jester King Brewery is a wonderful brewery out of Austin, Texas specializing in sour beers.  Their beers eschew classic Belgian styles and really chart their own course, but still have the quality and complexity that good sours should have.  I've reviewed their Atrial Rubicite HERE for a previous Whale A Week.  

Nocturn Chrysalis starts as a sour red ale, and is then barrel aged with a large amount of fresh blackberries.  For this second batch (April 2014) they used Marionberries from Oregon.  ABV is 5.9%, Final Gravity 1.000, pH 3.3. The beer has a score of 93 on Beer Advocate and 99 on Rate Beer. 



Cast of characters: Me (homebrewer for over 25 years, lover and brewer of sour beers); Sarajo (my wife and fan of sours); and fellow Jack Of All Brews member and award winning brewer Josh Welch. 

Nocturn Chrysalis 

Aroma: 

Eric: Mellow blackberry aroma.  Light tartness.  Hint of sweet berry.  Light sulfur notes.  Brett--funky leather as it warms up.

Josh: Strong smells of wet hay, slight solvent, light jammy fruit.  

Appearance:

Eric: Deep red to nearly magenta.  Persistent wispy off-pink froth.  Excellent clarity and ruby sparkles.

Josh: Slight white head.  Good clarity.  Nice purple color from the fruit.  No legs, rolls easily in the glass.

Flavor:

Eric: Ooh!  Up front very dry and tannic--almost leathery.  Middle of taste coats the tongue with dry berry and cherry pit flavors.  Finish lingers with distinct blackberry, funk, and oak tannins.  Spritzy and has a very light mouthfeel.  Dry but not astringent.  Fruit still shows through nicely despite age and dryness.  Not overly acidic.

Josh: Less aggressive than the aroma.  Dry, light acidity, effervescent.  Modest apparent sweetness.

Overall:

Eric: Wow!  I really love this use of blackberry!  Dry but mellow and the fruit is really present.  compared to last week's Beatification which was all acid and little brett, this one is mostly brett and mild acid.  Refreshing, palate cleansing--makes me want to keep drinking it.  4.75

Josh: 4.5

Sarajo: Tart and refreshing.  4.5

Overall Score: 4.67

A Whale A Week: Jester King Atrial Rubicite

Last week we talked about the stellar Mother Of All Storms from Pelican.  This week we change gears and try out a sour beer from Jester King--Atrial Rubicite!  This was part of an epic tasting with Surly Darkness and Goose Island BCS and was the only sour we tried.  Talk about a palate cleanser! We poured this into Surly Darkness and Steel Toe snifters for tasting.  Here is our cast of characters: Me (Eric)--homebrewer for over 25 years, beer judge, beer geek.  Sj--my wife who inexplicably is a woman of few words when it comes to reviewing beer.  Sean Kampshoff--Winner of National Homebrew Competition medals, beer judge, cool guy.  Jim & Cindy Moldenhauer--a very fun couple of craft beer geeks we got to know at several McCoy's Public House beer dinners.

Jester King Atrial Rubicite

So, living in Minnesota, I have always viewed Texas as a bit of a craft beer wasteland.  You know--land of lite beer, country music, big belt buckles, American flags, etc.  When I discovered that there is a farmhouse brewery specializing in sour beers in Austin, I was a little shocked and frankly a little skeptical.  Last year I made a big purchase of a local craft beer collector's cellar and found several of these little gems hiding in there.  Not knowing what to expect I did a little research on-line.  What?!  Turns out that Jester King beers are much in demand among the sour-head beer hoarders out there!  And I had a bunch just ready to try!  Oh, and the bottle labels are a work of art on most of these...

So on the beer: Atrial Rubicite is a barrel aged sour beer fermented with Washington raspberries.  It comes in 500 ml bottles with an awesome/disturbing label featuring a raspberry heart popping out of a ribcage.  ABV is only 5.8% so this is easy to drink.  They use their house yeast and wild local yeast to ferment this beer out.  Beer Advocate gives the beer a rating of a solid 100 and it is featured in their top 100 beers, while RateBeer also gives it a 100. 

Freya just loves sour beers!

Aroma:

Eric: Huge raspberry blast!  Very tart and makes the mouth pucker just sniffing this beer.  Slight sulfur notes.  Acetic, lactic, and brett funkiness.  No hops.  

Sean: Powerful raspberry aroma with a lactic sourness.  No malt character or hop aroma.  Jammy!

Jim: Raspberries!

Appearance: 

Eric: Bright clarity with a crazy red to deep pink color.  Fine pink head at the edge of the glass.  Some bubbles on sides of glass.

Sean: Bright ruby red.  Extremely clear.  Little head.

Cindy: Sailor's Sky--Red sky at night...

Jim: Red/amber

Flavor:

Eric: Fresh raspberry is front and center in this beer.  Tart but not overwhelmingly sour.  Has a strong tannic bite from fruit and seeds, also possibly from the barrel.  Has a woody, almost beet-like finish.  No alcohol warming.  No hops.  Body is light and spritzy.  Finish is slightly astringent and quite dry.  

Sean: Medium-high raspberry flavor with a similarly medium-high lactic sourness.  Finishes tart and extremely dry.

Cindy: Sour cherry and strawberry.

Jim: Tart, sour raspberries

Overall: 

Eric: Really pleasant beer, balanced right on the edge of too sour/dry with a lot of tannin.  I'd like just a hint more residual sweetness to balance it, but I'm splitting hairs.  This is one of the better American fruit lambics I've tried.  4.5

Sean: A tasty, cleanly lactic raspberry beer.  Refreshing.  Not overly sour and great raspberry character in aroma and flavor. 4.25

Cindy: 4.25

Jim: Pucker up! 4.5-4.75

Sj: "I'm a sour whore."  This is Raspberry-riffic! 4.5

Overall Tasting Score: 4.43

This was a very tasty beer, and impressive for using wild fermentation from Texas!  I'm excited to try the other Jester King beers I've got hiding in my cellar--they are safe no longer!