Review: Vessel Beer Salty Dog Salted American Pale Ale

A month back I received an email by the guys over at Brasserie Nonsuch announcing the launch of a new brand of beer called Vessel Beer. Vessel is a collaborative project that combines art and beer together, showcasing the artwork of talented artists on their beer. This reminds me a bit of Collective Arts Brewing out of Ontario, which is one of my favourite breweries so I'm absolutely excited to see this. So far, they've released two beers, Pineapple Peat Pale and Salty Dog. One of my friends who isn't even a fan of beer recently tried Pineapple Peat and was surprised by the flavours of the beer. I picked up a can of Salty Dog the very moment that my local LC was starting to put it on the shelves, I had a feeling that Vessel's beer possibly wouldn't make it to my neck of the woods but after harassing Nonsuch to send their beer for so long, I knew it would come to Brandon eventually.

Salty Dog Salted American Pale Ale is part of Vessel's cocktail-inspired series of beers. 5.5% ABV

Appearance: Pours a very cloudy orange body with a moderate amount of carbonation in the body. The head starts out quite thick but not in any way gushing, with a beige hue to it. The head diminishes fairly moderately, leaving behind a webbing of foam on the glass.

Aroma: This is quite reminiscent of a gose as it's quite salty, but not quite as sour/tart as I was expecting. The beer does have a moderate amount of lemon sourness to it, but also a good amount of floral and grassy hop presence to it, as well as a large presence of sweet barley. There's a bit of a funkiness that reminds me a bit of Brett, but I'm not quite sure.

Taste: Salty, ever so slightly sour with lemon, a bit funky but not overly. Decently dry Pale Ale with a grassy hop presence, as well as a mild floral/pine presence to it. Light amount of sweetness, citrusy and good amount of graininess from the barley. The aftertaste is a light barley presence with a bit of bitter hops.

Overall Thoughts: Every sip I take in this beer, I expect this to be a Sour/Gose but the sourness just doesn't really attack my palate at all, aside from a mild funkiness, so it's pretty interesting. I used to really like Goses/Sours but after having too many at Foudres Unis in Quebec two years ago.. I can only handle so much sour beer before wanting something light on the stomach like a Pilsner.

When I first sampled this a couple days ago, I was "wow, this is interesting!" So I will definitely will be buying this again, and not just because I'm a huge fan of Nonsuch, this is a bit different, nice for a hot summer day. I'm really intrigued by a whole series of cocktail-inspired releases, I can't wait for a rye + beer cocktail once Patent 5 Distillery next door can release their Whisky. Also, a Tequila Gose beer would be quite nice with lime, tequila and salt.