Jolly Pumpkin Perseguidor (Batch 1)

12oz bottle. Gold foil 2006 on the neck. Very pleasant sour, funky and spicy aroma. Loads of oak tannin. Fennel. Vanilla and cinnamon. Lighter notes of tart cherries. Wet basement and slightly cobwebby. Green apple skin. Apple cider vinegar. The La Roja comes through much more on the nose than the Bam. Plenty funky and the brett has taken full hold. Pours Thick, muddy but bright copper/orange. Even a rigorous pour yields a scant white head. The Bam comes through much more on the palate than the nose. Not nearly as funky, acidic and vinegary as the nose lead me to believe. Very dry. Wet grass. Wet leaf pile. Moderately tart and acidic... much more earthy... Slightly spicy. Subdued wood tannin. Very light cherry and vanilla. Slightly flabby (oily?) on the palate. The carbonation is still quite lively, though. The finish is rather acidic, and that’s where the La Roja really comes through on the palate. A fine beer for sure, but seems just a bit past it’s prime. Eben... you teh man!

(bottle thanks BDR for sharing the rarity!) Pours a hazy light brown with little head. Aroma is an odd but intriguing mixture of apple cider, brett, and with further warming a lot of dill and watermelon rind as well. Definitely have never smelled this in a beer and it’s really unique. The taste didn’t really appeal to me though, there was some light tart apple, sourness, dill, and butter flavor with an oaky finish. This butter flavor is really unappealing. This was a good smelling beer, but that didn’t carry over into the flavor.

A standard pour produces a finger-and-a-half thick, light tan colored head in my large Tripel Karmeliet tulip. The beer is a murky, reddish plum color that shows a hazy, opaque, maraschino cherry red color when held up to the light. The aroma up front is a mix of oak and tartness with aromas of vanilla, slight buttery oak, tamarind, sour raisin, concentrated sour plum and lightly spicy wood. Quite funky too with a rich, musty, damp earthiness, cobweb & musky Brettanomyces notes and some slight, ripe cheese character is also here. The barrel adds a touch of spiciness and even a hint of booziness that is reminiscent of Bourbon. I can’t exactly say why, as no single thing jumps out at me as being all that unique or even overly interesting, but the aroma on this is just really nice; spending dedicated time just smelling this beer is very easy to do.

This is sour tasting, though not aggressively so. It has a soft, yet persistent carbonation that adds a bit of a textural prickle as the beer flows across my tongue. This is quite dry, with no perceived sweetness to it at all, despite this it does have some heft and viscousness to it; it seems to have picked up some body boosting tannins during its sleep in the barrels. This is very quaffable and, if it wasn’t for the fact that I only had one twelve ounce bottle, I could easily drink this a lot faster than I am. Spicy oak flavors in the middle produce thoughts of Bourbon, these notes then meld in with the sourness that becomes a bit more dominant in the finish. Tart fruit flavors of plum, tamarind and raisin (without being sweet at all) are each noticeable. Oak influenced flavors of vanilla linger on the palate and there is a tough of butterscotch here as well. Not nearly as funky as the aroma (though it was fairly light there too), with more of a musty earthiness than anything.

The aroma was a bit more well integrated somehow than the flavor ends up being; the components are mostly the same, it is just that in the aroma they create an enticing, harmonious whole that is not quite achieved in the flavor. Despite seeming a little flat, the flavor is still quite good and I would happily drink more of this. A very drinkable beer; before I know it my glass is sadly empty.

bottle sampled at the beach. Wow this is one great beer. Moderately sour with a nice vanilla and oak finish. Excellent.

[’06 Bottle, big thanks go to BDR for sharing this retired beer!] Pours hazy orange with a tint of red, and topped off with a small off-white head. Aroma was really nice at first with a lot of oak and raisin, but then it became more dill and watermelon. Still, very nice. Taste was lightly tart, bitter, with some butter, dill again and a lot of oak. Bizarre. Mouthfeel was a little thin with a dry finish of average length. I liked the smell of this beer, even if it was strange, but the taste just wasn’t that good.