Flavour group
Funky & wild
Mixed and spontaneously fermented beers with Brettanomyces character — earthy, leathery and complex, often alongside acidity.
A BeerHQ grouping for finding beer, not an official classification. No style body recognises these, and that is fine — they exist to bridge the gap between how a beer tastes and what it is called.
Suits you if
- Enjoys natural wine, aged cheese or anything with a savoury, farmyard edge.
- Wants the most complex thing brewing produces.
- Is happy for a drink to be challenging rather than easy.
May not suit
- Almost anyone new to beer — this is the deep end and there is no point pretending otherwise.
- Drinkers who find savoury or barnyard aromas off-putting.
- Anyone shopping on price; these take years to make and are costed accordingly.
The shape of this group
5 styles in this group
- American wild ale
A broad New World category of mixed-fermentation and barrel-aged sour beers, often fruited, with no fixed base style.
- Flanders red ale
A deep red sour ale matured for years in oak foeders, balancing sharp acidity against dark fruit and a vinous depth.
- Lambic
Spontaneously fermented Belgian wheat beer, matured in oak for years — funky, acidic, dry and unlike any other beer.
- Gueuze
A blend of young and old lambic, refermented in bottle — intensely complex, bone dry and Champagne-like in its carbonation.
- Fruit lambic
Lambic refermented on whole fruit — traditionally sour cherry or raspberry — producing a dry, tart, intensely fruity beer.