Square Gose – our first Sour beer
A beer you’ll definitely be wanting in your corner, call out for Bellfield Brewery’s Square Gose (4.8%) safe in the knowledge that this beer won’t knock you down. Find out how we married a millennium-old German beer style with the salty kick of a passion fruit margarita.
Be the first to try this brand new sour beer and our first Weissbier – Weiss City (4.1%). Book a table alongside the Bellfield Brewing team in our Taproom: Thursday 13th July, 6pm - 7pm.
Usually, we are not so keen on customers seeking out a “Square Go” in our taproom. However, the only impact you'll experience from our new Square Gose – a 4.8% contemporary interpretation of a unique Germany sour style – is a softly effervescent hit of passion fruit with a light lactic sourness that will leave your taste buds ringing.
GOSE, AND IT GOES, AND IT GOES-AH: WHAT IS A GOSE?
The Gose, pronounced either "goes" or "goes-ah" (not to be confused with the more gutturally pronounced Belgian lambic style, Gueuze), takes its name from the small Lower Saxony town of Goslar.
Legend has it that the apparently unique, saline waters of the River Goslar contributed to the creation of this unique beer style. While the truthfulness of this origin story is debatable, the beer itself, which has been traced back to the end of the first millennium (around the year 1000), certainly deserves its legendary reputation.
It was in the city of Leipzig, 90 miles east of Goslar, where the style was popularised and the classic interpretation was established as the Leipziger Gose.
This east German style of beer directly defied the Bavarian Reinheitsgebot, or beer purity laws, which dictated in the western part of the country that beer could only be made with four ingredients: water, barley, yeast, and hops.
“Impure” to the core, Leipziger Goses were brewed with wheat instead of barley. But what really sets them apart are two key additions: coriander and salt.
‘Square’ in the name is also a nod to Gordon, our brewer, who filled 4 mini kegs with 4 different versions of the beer during development for the Bellfield team to evaluate. Each version was marked with a different symbol to differentiate them - a circle, triangle, square and star. The ‘square’ variant of the Gose was the stand out winner in the comprehensive team taste test.
TAKEN WITH A PINCH OF SALT: WHY IS THERE SALT IN MY BEER?
Herbacouness and brine may not be familiar flavour profiles to most beer drinkers, but as the popularity of pickle beers, cucumber or tzatziki sours prove, there is definitely a place for salinity in beer. Just as salt stimulates the taste buds in cooking, it can be a fundamental and flavour-boosting part of the brewing process.
In relation to a sour beer like a Gose, salt can help to mellow beer's inherent bitterness, bringing sweetness and sourness to the front of your palette.
In fact, it was the similar sensation you get from the savoury garnish of a salted rim on a margarita that inspired us to supercharge the style into something more contemporary.
IT’S A KNOCK-OUT: BREWING A GLUTEN-FREE GOSE
This brew is heavily influenced by our love for fruited sours. We've developed a taste for brewing with real fruit, as previously seen in our Vault City collaboration, Full Tilt Imperial Radler, and our International Women's Day beer, Wild Shore Saison, brewed with locally sourced Sea Buckthorn berries. We wanted to bring some of this modern fruit-forward influence to the Gose style.
Inspired by the thirst-quenching, sun-drenched, salty kick of a passion fruit margarita, we've added large amounts of passion fruit puree, orange, and lemon zest.
Yet we’ve still retained the old ways, adding rock salt and coriander at the end of the boil to impart the spirit of the Leipziger Gose. The coriander's citrus freshness complements the zest, while the salt amplifies a tangy and tart finish to the passion fruit.
Adhering to the gluten-free ethos, we use no wheat in the brew, instead utilising incredible pale and low-roasted, gluten-free, malt alternatives. This ensures the same output of flavour and colour, without compromising on the light malt flavour of the Gose.
At 4.8%, it's not a beer that will leave you on the floor, but one leaving you asking for more.
As Gordon Taylor, Bellfield brewer and mastermind behind this particular brew, puts it: ‘Scottish summers can be unpredictable, but hopefully with this beer in hand it'll allow you to stare torrential rain and blistering sun in the face and say "Square Gose!"’.
You can also enjoy a Square Gose at our local Safari Lounge and other venues, so look out on our social media for exactly where.
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