As we mentioned in an earlier post, the Gose style might be the best beer choice for spring and summer drinking. This wheat beer is top-fermented and gets a second fermentation with lactobacillus bacteria. This gives it a tart, sour flavor profile similar to your favorite sour ale. The addition of coriander and sea salt adds some spice and salinity to this very unique, refreshing beer.
On top of that, this tart, salty thirst-quencher is usually between 4-5% ABV. This results in a crushable, salty, crisp beer you won’t be able to put down even between horseshoe throws or cornhole turns.
A strange, salty history
This beer can be traced back to the 13th century in Germany. It started in the Saxony town of Goslar before gaining popularity in nearby Leipzig. While modern Gose-style beers are flavored with salt, the beer originally held a slightly salty flavor because of the high salinity of the water source.
Fruit adds more flavor
The Gose made its way to the US craft beer scene about ten years ago when Lost Nation released its aptly named “Gose.” Traditionally, the beer is crisp, salty, lightly spicy, sour, and very tart. This makes it a sublimely refreshing character and a great beer for unseasonably warm spring days and hot summer afternoons. Many brewers up the ante by adding various fruits like cherries, berries, grapefruit, tangerine, and even melon.
Our 5 favorite spring Gose beers
As we mentioned earlier, the Gose style is perfectly suited for warm (or downright hot) weather. When made well, it’s a great balance between tart, sour, salty, and spicy flavors. It’s crisp, refreshing, and great on a spring day. Now that you know a little bit about Gose beers, it’s time to find some to drink. To help you on your Gose journey, we did the work for you. Keep scrolling to see five great choices for spring imbibing.
Westbrook Key Lime
Westbrook makes a classic Gose-style beer that’s salty, refreshing, and perfectly tart. We prefer the brewery’s Key Lime version. This 4% ABV Gose was made with CTZ hops, American ale yeast, acidulated malt, pale malt, and wheat. It gets its unique, salty, tart, key lime pie flavor from the addition of cinnamon, coriander, key lime, sea salt, and vanilla.
Cigar City Margarita Gose
Tampa’s Cigar City is well-known for its IPA prowess, specifically its iconic Jai Alai IPA. But the award-winning brewery also makes a great Gose that was crafted to taste exactly like a Margarita. Who needs tequila, lime, and salt when you have a Gose-style beer with sea salt, orange peel, and lime essence? To add to that, it’s a refreshing 4.2% ABV.
Grimm Super Spruce
While many Gose-style beers rely on either the simple ingredients of sea salt and coriander or citrus or other fruit to flavor it, the brewers at Grimm Ales looked to spruce instead. This 4.7% ABV Gose-style beer is brewed with spruce, Chinook hops, sea salt, and white oak. The result is a complex, refreshing beer loaded with notes of tart citrus zest, floral hops, bright pine, and perfect salinity. It’s fresh, tart, sour, salty, and very memorable.
Lost Nation Gose
The OG American Gose-style beer, Lost Nation, is still as refreshing, crisp, tart, and pleasantly salty as it was back in 2013. Made the traditional German way, it’s brewed with coriander and sea salt. The result is a pleasantly dry, crisp beer filled with tart, fruity, salty, and very refreshing flavors. It’s the kind of beer that you’ll drink once, and you’ll want to go back to it again and again.
Anderson Valley Briney Melon
While this California-based brand makes myriad award-winning beer styles, it’s become quite adept at crafting Gose-style beers. One of our favorites is its Anderson Valley Briney Melon. This year-round, 4.2% ABV Gose was brewed with House yeast, pale 2-row malts, malted white wheat, rice hulls, and Chinook hops. It gets its fresh, fruity flavor from the addition of watermelon. The result is a thirst-quenching, tart, lightly salty beer filled with ripe watermelon flavor.
Bottom line
When it comes to Gose-style beers, you have two kinds to choose from. Do you want a classic, crisp, tart, salty refresher made with salt and coriander, or do you want one that also has flavors like watermelon, orange peels, berries, Key lime, cherries, or some other tropical fruit flavor? Your best option is to try the original first before moving on to the fruity, flavored version. It’s always a good idea to try the original before you move on to alternative versions.
