Magic Rock Salty Kiss

When I was in Booth's recently I let my beer nerd curiosity guide me in some of the beers I bought. One of the beers they sell Magic Rock Salty Kiss, a gooseberry gose. I did have to raise an eyebrow when I first saw this was being made, an ahistorical historical beer, but I was interested enough to buy a can.

Sorry, I could have sworn I had a picture of the much
prettier can but buggered if I can find it.

The beer was pale with more than a hint of murk, though not going as far as looking like soup. This is craft beer though, so I wasn't passing judgement on the clarity. It's all about the taste (and share ownership).

The first taste was a shock though. They haven't scrimped on the salt: "that's like drinking seawater" I thought. Minging. It seemed a little harsh to judge the beer on one sip, so I had another. Yup, still seawater, still minging. I started towards the sink at this point. I did have other beers to drink so why waste my time drinking something I didn't like? But then I thought of the advice on drinking lambics for the first time - you really need to finish the glass to appreciate it. So I kept on drinking.

The salty taste does fade and I noticed the slight sourness more. A sour and murky pint is still something I would normally take straight back but I kept with it and the fruit started to come through. With the sourness it tasted more like citrus fruit than gooseberry to me but at least I was starting to get something positive about the beer.

By the end the flavours were starting to come together: salty, fruity, vaguely unpleasant. More like an isotonic sports drink in flavour than a beer. It was interesting, but not to my taste.