BEER REVIEW: What Even is Blue Raspberry Anyway? from EVIL TWIN BREWERY

My search for the best beer in New York continues….

As you may know, one of the many essential businesses that has continued to operate during the pandemic are breweries. I am very grateful for this. It means that I’ve still managed to find freshly made local beer.

And what’s crazy is that somehow during this lockdown, I’ve noticed a new beer trend start to emerge.

When I purchased this crazy beer from Evil Twin, I wasn’t sure what exactly to expect. I was mostly sold by my interest in the brewery and the captivating can art and name.

It’s called What Even is Blue Raspberry Anyway? and it’s labeled as a Sour IPA brewed with raspberries. Oftentimes Evil Twin names their beer some random unrelated sentence so I was surprised (although maybe subconsciously expected it) when I poured it into a can and the color of the beer was blue.

And then I remembered seeing other breweries post photos and stories about their new sour blue raspberry concoctions tinted with a strange almost cleaning solution color.

I guess blue beers have become a trend and nobody told me.

The color of this actually was a bit green. Regardless it is not a color I expect in my beer. Certainly intriguing and then I go back to the name of the beer. Blue Raspberry, of course, is a common candy flavor but what is it anyway?

Well whatever it is, Evil Twin nails the flavor of those childhood candies that seem to only exist to create an enticing color for kids.

I am relieved after looking up the ingredients that the color comes from the addition of butterfly pea flower and not some numbered chemical.

The beer smelled like a sour candy, which was never my favorite type of candy but it did bring back childhood memories at the park’s candy kiosk. My first sip was like a warhead overly sour and incredibly tart. Most of the saliva in my mouth disintegrated.

But then the beer mellowed out a bit. It became a more pleasant sour. I can’t say it was really my thing and I can’t imagine drinking a second one of these, but it was an interesting experience and evidently part of the latest trend.

Is Evil Twin’‘s What Even is Blue Raspberry Anyway? the best beer in NY? It was my first blue beer and possibly the sourest I’ve ever tried so it’s hard to really compare it to much. But it was a neat experiment and not something I feel the need to repeat. That being said, it does get a  7 out of 10 for creativity and technique.