AleSmith IPA

Brewed by AleSmith Brewing Company
Style: India Pale Ale (IPA)
San Diego, California USA

Serve in Shaker, Tulip

Acquired via trade w/ peacehammer. Pours a clear burnt orange with a nice pillowy off white head that sticks around for a while. Aroma is brilliant... Citrusy hops, I’m getting a lot of grapefruit and mango. The taste keeps pace with the promise of the aroma... Sticky, bitter bliss with a nice malty backbone to hold it all together. This is a beautiful beer. No wonder it is the #1 IPA. Im so glad I go t to try this one...

hazy golden color, citrus pine aroma, flavor is citrus pine with a malty balance and doughy yeast finish, one of my favorite IPAs

UPDATED: FEB 6, 2012 Bottle pours hazy orange with a medium white head. Aroma is grassy hops with lots of underlying notes of pineapple and citrus rinds. Flavor is sweet candied pineapple and juicy hops ending on the pine side, oily consistency with lots of lingering bitter pine.

Poured from a draft into a pint glass at Vine Cottage in La Mesa, Calif. Color was honey pale, kind of light. Light head once I got it, maybe ½ inches. Light bubbly lacing on the top. Circular white film on the sides. Smelled citrus hops up front. Fairly hoppy. Main citrus notes were orange and tangerines. Didn’t taste too much like the nose. Very bitter in the beginning. Grainy and earthy. Medium body. Thick grainy texture. Average-to-above average (lively) carbonation. Bitter finish. Not a bad beer, but a bit disappointing considering the look and smell. I thought about going higher on the sight, which may have led me to give it an overall rating of a 3.5.

Pours a clear red-orange with a thick, fluffy just off-white head. Aroma is caramel, citrus, fruit, pine, bubblegum. Taste is strong, citrus and alcohol up front. This fades into a warm almost sweetness; then a strong bitter, fruit rind finish. Laces like crazy. Mouth feel is warm and chewy. Overall, a fine IPA.

This is amazing. Period. Perfect hoppy, citrusy, and every so slightly sweet taste, with a long, hoppy, piney, bitter finish. Only thing that could be improved is the aroma, maybe a slightly fresher bottle would have earned this a 5.

Originally rated 08/23/11. Pours a super orangey amber. Small but very tight off-white head. Smell is lots of grapefruit and other really sharp crisp citrus bitter but juicy hops. Not so much tropical fruits, but like a bitter sour grapefruit smell. There’s some pine, and very little malt, but definitely smells like a resiny hoppy bomb. In the taste, up front its amazingly clean, with more bright crisp citrus flavours. There’s lemon and sour grapefruit, not altogether bitter at first, mostly a juicy fruity hop that has a nice bit of sweetness. Then I can feel the hop profile building, and while that juicy hop character sticks around, the bitterness very slowly creeps in. The more that it warms, I definitely get more malty flavours, but that Hop bitterness hasn’t died out at all. I’m left with hoppy bitterness in my mouth with some peppery/spicy notes, and realistically no alcohol. I would say its medium bodied, definitely full of flavour though, and the carbonation is fairly noticeable – perfect for the style in my books. It’s amazingly well balanced, and extremely flavourful, and the manner in which the hoppy bite comes in I’ve never experienced in a beer before. At first you feel like you might be missing out a little bit, and that the beer might be lacking that hop slam, but the flavour profile slowly yet exponentially builds. I’m left feeling like I’ve just licked the rind of a grapefruit. I’m confident this is the grapefruitiest beer I’ve had. If you put a grapefruit, skin and all, into a blender, pureed and strained it, this beer would still taste more like grapefruit than that.

Got this in a trade with Daknole. For a standard IPA this is fantastic, one of the best. Strong solid hop flavor. Very piney taste to it. A bit of spruce and herb. Very smooth. This was a really tasty beer. Wish it was more available. Awsome.