Sunday, March 2, 2014

Founders Centennial IPA




















Founders Brewing Company
Founders Centennial IPA
Grand Rapids, Michigan
9/1/2011, bottle, 7.2 abv

Smell

Hops, caramel, grapefruit & pine.

Appearance

Deep, clear orange with a 1/4" white head.

Taste

Plenty of pine and bitter, citrusy hops, but not over the top. There is some equalizing maltiness that makes it nicely balanced.

Comments

A solid American IPA brought from Michigan by a friend.

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Victory DirtWolf










Victory Brewing Company
Victory DirtWolf
Downington, PA
01/01/2014, bottle, 8.7 abv

Comments
DirtWolf is my favorite offering from Victory to date. Pours a hazy gold with a decent head that hangs around for a while. The smell is great, with juicy hops and citrus.. The taste continues with some pine resin joining the hops and citrus and finishes with a little malty sweetness. Carbonation is moderate and the mouthfell is sticky and somewhat prickly. Goes down easy for a double IPA.

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Saturday, October 19, 2013

Left Coast Hop Juice Double IPA







Left Coast Brewing Company
Hop Juice Double IPA
San Clemente, CA
10/11/2013, on tap at Frisco Tap House, 9.7 abv

Smell

Great aroma of pine and grapefruit.

Appearance

Slightly hazy amber-orange with a small head and moderate carbonation.

Taste

Smooth, creamy mouthfeel with sweet citrus up front and a touch of resiny pine bitterness on the finish. The 9.7 abv is almost undetectable, making this rather dangerous. With a name like Hop Juice, it was much more balanced than I expected, but make no mistake, the hops dominate.

Comments

I enjoyed this DIPA a lot. I don't see many Left Coast offerings here on the right coast, so I was glad I had the opportunity to try this one.

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Yards Cicada Indigineous Ale








Yards Brewing Company
Cicada Indigenous Ale
Philadelphia, PA
9/28/2013 on tap at T-Bonz, 8.5% abv

Smell

Aroma is somewhat earthy, sweet caramel. For a Belgian IPA, I did not get the usual Belgian funk.

Appearance

Clear dark copper with a thin head. Not much carbonation.

Taste

Very sweet, caramel taste with a hint of prunes and very little bitter hop finish. It is good, but too sweet for me. I made the mistake of ordering this before my meal. It would have been better after.

Comments

Name a beer after a cool bug and I'm there. I probably would have ordered it if was made with actual cicadas.

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Sunday, August 4, 2013

Green Flash Palate Wrecker


















































Green Flash Brewing Company
Green Flash Palate Wrecker
San Diego, California
06/08/2013 on tap at River Hill Sports Grill, 9.5 abv

Smell

Aroma is very resiny and piney with some caramel coming through.

Appearance

Hazy, deep orange with a thick, white head.

Taste

This is definitly a heavy handed hop bomb with bitter pine and citrus flavors, but it has some sweet caramel maltiness to help balance it out. I said "help" balance it out. It is rated at 146 IBUs. The 9.5 abv becomes more noticible as it warms up. It is not quite as destructive as the name implies, but definitely for hop heads only.

Comments

Any beer that threatens to do damage to a body part has my attention. Green Flash has several taste bud dissolving beers that I enjoy, but it is hard to beat their West Coast IPA. They may be trying just a little to hard with Palate Wrecker.

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Saturday, August 3, 2013


















































Maui Brewing Company
Maui CoCoNut PorTer
Lahania, Hawaii
06/22/2013, on tap at Frisco Tap House, 6.0 abv

Smell

Smell is a combination of burnt coffee, chocolate and vanilla.

Appearance

Very dark drown with mahogany highlights and a small, beige head.

Taste

I got lots of pleasant flavors, like coffee, chocolate, burnt toast & vanilla. It was very smooth and had a slippery mouthfeel. All good, but no coconut.

Comments

This is a very good porter. If I could have detected ANY toasted coconut, I would have given it 4 mugs. Perhaps it was the restaurant setting, perhaps it wasn't as fresh as it should be, but if you call it CoCoNut Porter, it should taste like coconut.
Or perhaps I was just hoping it would taste like one of these from my youth:
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Saturday, June 15, 2013


















































Wurzburger Hofbrau
Julius Echter Hefe-Weissbier Hell
Wurzburg, Germany
06/08/2013, on tap at Frisco Tap House, 4.9 abv

Smell

Smell is reminiscent of banana bread.

Appearance

Hazy golden color with losts of bubbles forming a nice head.

Taste

Taste is wheaty, yeasty and the banana bread come through, but it is not overly sweet. Nice carbonation and some slight hop bitterness give it some zing at the end.

Comments

This was a very nice hefeweizen. Not too much funky yeast and wheat made it quite enjoyable to drink.

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