Review: Upright Brewing Flora (2016)


This is something I don't ever recall buying but either I bought it on a whim in Winnipeg or else someone gave me this beer.. most likely it was given to me. Upright Brewing is a brewery out of Portland, Oregon and their Flora is a Saison composed of four casks matured twelve months. This batch is from their 2016 vintage and I'm pretty darn excited to try it!

Appearance: Flora pours an opaque orange body with a moderate amount of micro-carbonation taking place in the body. The head is a nice finger and a half's worth of creamy white-beige head that's quite frothy.

Aroma: This is taking me back to memories of Quebec and Vermont - this has a nice Saison profile to it, with a moderate barnyard funkiness to it. It's fairly sweet with a hint of citrusy fruit profile (hint of mango maybe?) and lemon. Slight floral hop presence, bit of bubble gum sweetness, but of course.. your typical American Farmhouse vibe to it.. a mild sourness/barnyard funk as stated before. This is almost like a perfume so far.

Taste: This is incredibly sour right from the beginning, it has a bit of a vinegar profile to it but also notes of white wine as well. There's a moderate barnyard funkiness to it giving it some woodiness, some straw, and thankfully no notes of manure! It's fairly sweet with notes of seems to be a combo of candi sugar and bubble gum. It's fairly dry, acidic, very carbonated on the palate, and definitely something that my stomach won't agree with in 20 minutes from now.

Overall Thoughts: Quite a solid representation of your modern era American Saison/Farmhouse Ale, I've definitely tried a bunch in Vermont/southern Quebec that were just like this beer. It brings me back memories of my visit to Hill Farmstead in Vermont three years ago. This is quite sour, has a good amount of barnyard funk to it, but it also has a moderate sweetness that I'm really enjoying. I'm not really a sour fan but this 2016 vintage has aged pretty well so far! 5.5% ABV


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