O’so Brewing Company - Space Ace Oddity

We do love exclusives. The first batch of this exceptional beer from our friends over at O’so Brewing Co. was released back in 2016, as a one-off tribute to David Bowie. And, somehow, we were able to convince them to rebrew Space Ace Oddity for a Rare Beer Club exclusive this month. O’so does a lot of complex sour beers as a key part of their operation, and Space Ace Oddity combines masterful Brettanomyces characteristics that join perfectly to this beer’s generous, tropically inclined hopping. The Galaxy, Nugget and Sorachi Ace additions help to make this, in tandem with the Brett, one of the brightest, most refreshing hoppy beers we’ve found in quite some time. It’s hazy, deep, super tropical—and an absolute pleasure to drink.

Space Ace Oddity’s picture-perfect in the glass, with a subtle wheat-like haziness that seems to almost glow, teetering between straw and deeper golden in color. The color’s a touch like unfiltered honey (though the flavor profile’s focused on the hops). A strong, resilient foam forms—brightly white, and fluffy—and the cloud-like texture is pretty consistent with how smooth this beer tastes. The foam’s also nicely retained and, more or less, stuck around the entire time we were tasting through our samples. The resulting aromatics are effortless, even direct from the fridge, launching generous degrees of juicy lime, pineapple, bitter grapefruit and papaya. The line between characteristics from the Brett conditioning and the fruity hops is really hard to find—which is a good thing. This is seamlessly tropical and mouthwatering.

The flavors fulfill everything the aromatics promise and more. There’s firm bitterness here, for sure (for us, that’s really essential to take anything with “IPA” in its name seriously), and if you were to block out the pineapple- and lime-led Brett components, the rest of the profile shows beautifully as an IPA archetype: lightly hazed but not chalky, streamlined mouthfeel, a satisfying bitter bite, and (best of all) no astringency to speak of. Then add the many impacts from the Brettanomyces back in, the subtle funk and the ripest tropical components—and you now have something transcendent, with the overall IPA feel unimpinged by wild yeast notes (none of the common aspirin-like flavors, for instance), while the yeast and hops work with each other to transcend the amount of tropical flavor normally available to either one alone.

Zesty carbonation adds an ideal amount of vibrancy, while the dry finish descends into pine: nicely bitter without sticking. As with many of our favorite beers, the little details just line up perfectly here, accentuating the very best parts of how this beer is put together. Overall, this reminded us a lot of the greatest combinations of hops and Brett we’ve enjoyed—from folks like Gabe up at Anchorage Brewing Co., especially, though this (poured fresh) is still quite a bit more on the tropical/pineapple edge of the spectrum rather than kicking up the acidity of Anchorage. We fell in love with how this Brett IPA is put together—we hope you do, too!

The fact that Space Ace Oddity is bottle-conditioned with Brett gives it a way longer lifespan than otherwise, and the wild yeast will serve its roles of gobbling up any oxygen that makes it into the bottle and continuing to develop this beer over time. This beer’s very pineapple-y in its fresh months, and we definitely recommend folks enjoy this one early, at least once to see how it’s put together. If you want to see how much the Brettanomyces presence will increase in funkiness and acidity, don’t be afraid to cellar bottles to see how they develop; just know the hop presence will fall off pretty quick. For pairings, that modest heft and tropical-fruit focus suggest, for us, roasted or grilled chicken dishes, or a creamy cheese that plays off said fruit.

O’so Brewing Company, in the small village of Plover, Wisconsin, has quietly become one of the very best breweries in the state—and we’re pumped to be able to bring one of their most delicious beers to our members as a Rare Beer Club exclusive. O’so was founded in 2007 by husband-and-wife team Marc and Katina Buttera, who both grew up in Kenosha, Wisconsin. (Quick geography lesson: Kenosha’s basically in the very southeast corner of the state, along the shores of Lake Michigan, while Plover couldn’t be more in Wisconsin’s exact center.) It took a whole lot of steps in-between to get O’so Brewing Co. running, as Marc and Katina raised two young children while working and going to school (which is pretty badass, let’s be real). Marc earned a degree in mechanical design and Katina earned hers in accounting, and, after establishing their careers and even moving their family away to Tennessee (for Marc to take a promotion at the foundry he worked for), they realized that something was missing.

As these stories often go: homebrewing soon changed everything. After moving back to the middle of Wisconsin, the couple would open up Point Brew Supply (a beer- and winemaking supply shop) as a side project, which gradually transitioned into a five-year plan to also open O’so Brewing, which they founded in 2007. In the period since, both entities have grown in leaps and bounds. O’so has been one of the fastest growing breweries in the state; their year-round The Big O wheat ale won gold at the Great American Beer Festival in 2015; and their hoppy and sour releases, especially, have made them one of the most influential breweries in Wisconsin. We’ve followed these folks for a while—and finally snagged a perfect club beer.

(It also happens to be one of the most delicious Brett IPAs we’ve ever crossed paths with.)

Should you happen to find yourself anywhere near the center of Wisconsin, O’so Brewery’s Tap House offers up an exceptional selection both of the brewery’s house beers along with a surprising number of beers from all around the state. As O’so puts it, “Our mission as a Tap House is to promote a ton of great Wisconsin beer.” So: 40 taps in total, including 20–25 of their own, and the Tap House regularly highlights members of the Wisconsin Brewers Guild. For more info on O’so, upcoming Tap House events and more, visit www.osobrewing.com.