Pucker up, sour lovers! One of the pioneers of the Northwest is coming to Texas. If you’re not already familiar with Cascade Brewing in Portland, Oregon, it’s time to get acquainted.
Cascade Brewing is known for its tart, barrel-aged brews, known to produce puckering. The brewer’s artisanal approach imbues every beer it produces:
We are, by nature, the definition of artisanal brewing: We’re not bound by stylistic guidelines, just our own imagination and the ingredients we can access. Our brewery currently houses more than 750 French oak, Kentucky Bourbon and Northwest wine barrels filled with wheats, blonds, quads, reds, browns and porters that are aged and blended into magical elixirs.
Texas is the newest state on the Cascade roster. Previously, the brewer saw full distribution in Oregon, Washington, California, South Carolina and Massachusetts, with limited distribution in New York, Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Florida.
We don’t know much about which Cascade beers Texas will be receiving, but we do know Sang Rouge Northwest Style Sour has been given label approval by TABC, so be on the lookout for bottles to hit shelves soon. Sang Rouge is a blend of red ales aged in oak wine barrels and oak foudres for up to three years.
But back to the puckering. A word to the uninitiated: Cascade beers are SOUR. They’re also delicious. Drinking the brewer’s sour ales is akin to drinking liquid Sour Patch Kids, which should give you an idea of what to expect when you take that first sip.
As far as flavor goes, you can expect deep and complex notes that come from aging the beers in different types of barrels. It takes a lot of time to produce the beers that Cascade puts out, but the singular final product makes it worth the time.
We welcome Cascade to the Lone Star State and look forward to more and more breweries opening up distribution to Texas. If you’ve had the pleasure of sampling Cascade’s beers, let us know which ones you enjoy in the comments section. Cheers!
