Rode out to the Zymurnauts - SPBW - Guild Crab Feast 2008 Saturday at the Goddard Space Flight Center Recreation Center.

Great day, nice setting, really good beer.

The home-brewed watermelon ale was gone by the time I got there, but I did try another home brew, pineapple upside down ale. Let's just say I liked it better than pineapple upside down cake. There was a crisp clean Pils, a hoppy IPA, and very good porter with a questionable name, Leaky Butt Porter. The butt it refers to is the one that plugs up the hole in the brewing vessel, or so I was told.

The beer of the day was the sour ale brewed by Ben Schwalb of Severna Park.  Ben brought two and a half gallons of the ale to the gathering, but it was gone in no time.

This was my first sour ale. It was not quite vinegar, but very close. Nonetheless, I liked it. It had a light body, and yes, a sour taste, but had refershing citrus notes. 

Schwalb told me he had inherited the yeast used to make this ale from the late Ron Kodlick, who was a member of the beer drinking group known as the Cross Street Irregulars. Mr. Kodlick had obtained the yeast from the University of Michigan, Schwalb said.

The yeast has made several prize-winning sour ales, including the one that captured the top prize for home brew at the 2005 BAM beer festival in Timonium, Schwalb said.

This particular sour ale was fermented last winter, Schwalb said, and has been aging since April in an old Heaven Hill whiskey barrel. 

Anyone a fan of sour ales?

They do take some getting used to. The aroma can scare you, right?