Central City Imperial IPA

Brewed by Central City Brewing
Style: Imperial/Double IPA
Surrey, Canada

Serve in Shaker, Snifter

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On tap at the Alibi Room. Poured a nice orange colour. The aroma was very hoppy and had a distinct smell of apples or herbs. The taste was extremely well balanced. This is easily one of my favourite beers and hope it becomes a little bit more widely available

Draught at the brewpub, 9.5% ABV, as Imperial IPA
Red amber color; small creamy head. Very nice hoppy, fruity aroma; light bergamot and cedar. Good body strength; strong toffee and caramel flavor, mostly dry (luckily, there is not much residual sweetness); strong hopping, but well blended in this brew; resins, pine needles, a bit of fruitiness, and a rustic, sweaty touch too.
Excellent hop brew. Balance and power.

Growler from brewery. Pours bright amber orange with a thick soapy head leaving a good amount of lace on the glass. Huge orange, grapefruit hop aromas. An Amarillo bomb. The freshness of the hops in this beer are outstanding again orange, grapefruit, big bitter component. Quite a malt presence in this as well but it’s sweetness goes well with the citric hops and also gives the beer quite a full mouthfeel. Dangerously drinkable, I must have killed half the growler in one sitting. A great rendition of the I2PA.

GCBF 2010, on cask. Burnt orange, hazy. Huge juniper aroma. Enormously hoppy, stemmy, leafy, conifer aromas with earthy/woody elements. Crazy good stuff!

UPDATED: SEP 23, 2007 Draught at the brewery: Bright amber. Woody, flowery, powdery hop nose. Sweet, soft sugars temper resiny hops, with hints of pine, melon, grapefruit, mandarin. Smooth but insistent bitterness washes over the palate. Very fresh hop character and an incredible sense of balance.

Cask at GCBF: Vibrant, hazy amber. Assertive chinooky, amarilloish aroma. Sweet and fruity character, with amarillo and pommelo and some sugary notes to balance it off. Nice brew with a good sense of balance. Ar 7 Ap 4 Fl 8 P 4 O 16 = 3.9

UPDATED: APR 17, 2013 650mL bottle as Central City Imperial IPA, at 9.5% ABV, pours a hazy golden orange with a small off-white head. Aroma of loads of grapefruit, tropical fruits (mangos especially), boatloads of citrus hops and generous caramel malt to back. Flavour is remarkably well-balanced, with no shortage of palate-barraging citrus hops, mangos, pineapples, and a big caramel malt backbone. Exceedingly well-balanced and still very hoppy - absolutely delightful. This beer has progressed impressively over the years. From memory, the tap version of this used to be quite astringent and unbalanced. Recent tap versions of this are pretty much identical to this bottle I’m rating now. I hope this becomes a more regular brew as it’s phenomenal.

Crystal malt comes through for a beautiful IIPA. If I were to choose a fruit to describe it... which I will... pomegranate seems the best fit. Medium carbonation. Quite good... in fact, the winner of the Hopoxia mini-festival for me.

On tap at the Alibi Room. Pours cloudy amber orange, not much head. Aroma of citrus hops and pine. Flavour is predominantly hoppy with little malt background, small hint of grapefruit. Very bitter finish.

Gorgeous pour: a thick mass of foam sits atop a bedrock of amber fluid. The head lasts long and leaves light lacing. Piquant fresh hop aroma. Cannabis forward in nose and taste. Body avoids the syrupy thickness that can plague I2PAs. It is too one-dimensional to be big-bodied, but I welcome the refreshingly light nature of a beer with 8.5%ABV. I could drink several of these in succession. The hop assault kicks ass, beating any residual malt into oblivion. I like that, which is why I think this is overall a killer beer. (from growler procured from brewery Nov 5)

In short: A heavy caramelized citrusy IPA of high intensity, eh. Very good, eh
How: Bottle 22oz, eh. Consumed relatively fresh, approximately 2 months after the bottle version was released, first and only bottling at the moment, eh
The look: Clear amber-copper body topped by a medium beige head with medium retention, eh
In long: Nose is heavy on the citrusy fruits front with also a strong hops resin character, eh. Taste has a solid caramelized malts body, very sweet but not bothersome because it is rich creamy caramelized sweetness and doesn’t feel ‘sugary’, eh. This fine malt extraction almost steals the spotlight from the citrusy hops, eh. The hopping is intensely citrusy and also rather resinous, eh. Bitterness sensation is pretty high and it is also a bitterness with a sticky sensation, eh. This is a well balanced tasty IPA, very heavy on the malt front, almost feels like a toned down SN Bigfoot, eh. I usually prefer my Double IPAs a bit more ‘refreshing’ (à-la Hill Farmstead) but as far as heavy sipper-style IPAs are concerned, this is a very good offering, eh. And in order to honor this fine Canadian beer I decided to write this rating in our native Canadian language, he. I hope you can understand it, eh.