As an ancient Norwegian brewer’s yeast, kveik is incredibly sought after by American craft houses nowadays.

Brewers adore the Scandinavian strain for the unique flavors it imparts, especially the tropical notes of papaya, mango, tangerine, orange, and guava.

But, the finicky yeast isn’t easy to work with — to keep it free from cross-contamination with other cultures takes some seriously fine-tuned skill! Lucky for Shades Brewing, an on-site laboratory and resident microbiologist make this task a little less difficult.

Using their lab to purify the kveik yeast, the brewers opted to employ its tropical accents to embolden the bright, vivacious flavors of real, sweet cherries in today’s Kveik 2.

To make this special sipper, the data-driven brew crew pitched their refined kveik yeast into a puckering Golden Sour Ale base and allowed it to naturally ferment. Once it reached its prime, they blended in a whopping 3 lbs of sweet cherries per gallon — that’s like 6 cups of whole cherries squeezed into a one gallon jug! 

Despite the massive amount of fruit in this beer, the cherry flavor is beautifully nuanced. With every sip, complementary swirls of tender papaya and drippy mango from the kveik accent the juicy brightness of sweet cherries. On the finish, a lip-pursing tartness comes into play, before fading into a pleasant, yeasty funk.

To anyone familiar with the unique beauty of kveik yeast, tasting it alongside sweet cherries in a Sour Ale from Shades is a must. And, to those who may be hearing of this ancient strain for the first time, you’d be hard pressed to find a better introduction than Kveik 2.