Fruit Tramp Grapefruit & Blood Orange

Dust Bowl Brewing Company — Turlock, CA

11 Aug 2019 · Stephen

Sour Dust Bowl Brewing Company

4.5% ABV

Light ruby Color

Contributing Factors

Presentation –

Character ✓

Experience ✓

Return –

2 / 4 A solid effort

Tasting Notes

Appearance Light ruby — the blood orange contribution pulling the color into vivid citrus territory, brighter than the boysenberry variant's purple and more vivid than a straight grapefruit addition would produce. Hazy and inviting.

Aroma Grapefruit leads — bright, slightly bitter, pithy citrus that announces itself immediately. Blood orange comes in behind it with a darker, more complex fruit note — more vinous, slightly richer, giving the nose a layered quality that straight grapefruit alone can't achieve. The kettle sour lactic base provides a clean tartness underneath both fruits — present and reinforcing the citrus acidity rather than competing with it.

Palate Tart flavor with a big blood orange — your field note, and accurate. The grapefruit bite arrives first and leads assertively, the blood orange sweetness building behind it to provide relief from what would otherwise be a relentlessly acidic experience. The kettle sour lactic acidity works in concert with the grapefruit's natural bitterness and tartness — a genuinely funky after taste reminiscent of kombucha, as another drinker notes. At 4.5% ABV the body is light and the tartness has nothing heavy to push against, which makes it hit harder than the ABV suggests.

Finish Short, tart, citrus-bright, and completely clean. The grapefruit bitterness and blood orange sweetness resolve together quickly, leaving a refreshing sour close that makes the next sip — or the second can — completely automatic. First sour was sooooo refreshing I needed another. That's the finish talking.

The Verdict

he Fruit Tramp series at its most citrus-forward — grapefruit bite and blood orange depth in a kettle sour base at 4.5% ABV. An easy drinking go-to sour, nice flavor with the orange and grapefruit.

— Stephen · Contributing Factor Brewing · 11 Aug 2019