I was a little sick last week, so both the Beer Barrel and my actual drinking were somewhat abbreviated, and this review is going up very, very late. But better late than never, right? Right? If you’d prefer never, please don’t tell me. Let’s talk about beer instead.

Avery Brewing in Boulder, Colorado is not new to the Beer Barrel, but this is the first time I’ve reviewed one of their beers here; Cuntler, back when this was his feature, wrote on Avery White Rascal, one of his wife’s favorites, and also one of lady snow’s favorites, and a beer I quite like as well. Avery’s an outstanding brewery that excels in every single area of beermaking, from stouts to sours, from monster 17-percenters to easy-drinking pilsners. They’re not afraid to experiment, either, as they’ve recently demonstrated with a series of sour ales designed to evoke the flavors of beverages outside the world of beer: an old fashioned-inspired, bourbon barrel-aged cherry beer, a tequila barrel-aged sour with salt and lime added, and most recently, Certatio Equestris, a tart, bright ale aged in bourbon barrels, infused with mint, and perfect for your Triple Crown horse race. Let’s go straight to lady snow with this one.

lady snow says: Yep, that’s how I think a mint julep would taste if it were a sour beer!

make it snow says: There’s not as much bourbon as I was expecting. I think for me it’s getting lost between the mint and the sourness. It’s still there, just not that strong. On the other hand, this is the most I’ve ever tasted mint in a beer.

lady snow says: Oh, absolutely. I’m trying to remember that one other beer we tried, I think at one of the Draught House anniversary parties. A stout or a porter. But that one tasted more like cilantro, honestly, and this one actually tastes like it has mint leaves in it.

make it snow says: It tastes like someone just crushed up some mint leaves in the bottom of the glass. It’s that fresh.

lady snow says: We used to have mint in my backyard, and I’d pick leaves off and chew them. This is just like that.

make it snow says: It’s really nice and sour, too, in way that sticks with you all the way through the sip.

lady snow says: Yeah, I really like this.

make it snow says: And it’s bigger than a lot of Avery’s other sours, at 8.9%. Probably contributing a lot to that big base sour flavor, which reminds me a lot of another big sour, Jester King Boxer’s Revenge.

lady snow says: Wooooo! Mommy’s getting plastered tonight!

Grade:

tl;dr: No. Go back and read it, dammit.

make it snow is an alot of beer. He and lady snow each enjoyed six ounces of Avery Certatio Equestris while writing this review.