Phillips Pucker Plucker Cherry Sour Ale
Reviewed by Brady White on July 24, 2016 in Summer Guide
The Details
- Brewery: Phillips Brewing Company
- Origin: Victoria, BC, CA
- Rated On: July 24, 2016
- Best Before: December 12, 2016
- ABV: 6.3%
- Ideal Temperature: cool to cellar temperature
- Style: Kettle Sour
- Rating: GOOD !
The Review

This 650ml bottle pours a slightly hazy, pale copper amber colour, with two fingers of puffy, loosely foamy, and rather fizzy off-white head, which leaves a tiny bit of remote islet lace around the glass as it quickly evaporates.
It smells of tart cherry and generic stone fruit, lightly soured cream, grainy pale malt, a touch of wayward son yeast, and fairly tame earthy, leafy, and weedy green hop bitters. The taste is bready and doughy pale malt, a twinge of caramel sweetness, cherry cough drops plunked into cherry juice, gentle milky sour essences, a further mixed pome and citrus fruitiness, and more laid-back leafy, weedy, and somewhat floral hoppiness. The bubbles are pretty tame in their thinned-out frothiness, the body a so-so middleweight, and mostly smooth, I suppose, the neutered fruitiness having the most sway here, it would appear. It finishes off-dry, the mix of bready malt, easygoing lactic sourness, and muddled cherries the ongoing story.
Overall, a more or less pleasant sour cherry ale, all components representing, and none overdoing it or overstaying their welcome. Simple, I guess, but easy enough to drink, without even a whisper from the 6.3 points of ABV. Worth checking out if you’re a newbie sour-head wannabe, and I mean that in the nicest way possible.