Flying Monkeys Hoptical Illusion Almost Pale Ale

Brewed by Flying Monkeys Craft Brewery
Style: Amber Ale
Barrie, Canada

Serve in English pint, Shaker

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Found a 6 pack of it at the LCBO and really enjoyed it. Not quite hoppy enough for me but there was a good depth of flavour that made up for it. Also very sessionable, I could really drink it all night. Also just love the packaging a marketing of it, really just makes it a much more intriguing beer to drink.

UPDATED: OCT 31, 2009 [2322-20090722] Tap. Mild citrus toast bite aroma. Clear, bright amber body with a long-lasting creamy off-white head and nice thick lacing. Very tasty malt toast flavour with a long toasty hops finish. Medium body has nice bitterness. Wonderful balance of hops and malt, really enjoyable. (6/4/8/4/17) 3.9
(@ C’est What; Toronto, ON)

[2507B-20091002] Tap. Plastic hop spruce aroma. Murky, dark brown amber body with a quick bubbly white head. Spruce hops resiny bark flavour has a fruity finish. Medium body is flat. Really interesting fruity spruce hops and bizarre ’crystal’ clear taste. (6/2/7/3/14) 3.4
(21st FFOCB @ C’est What; Toronto, ON; Called "Hoppopatamonkey")

UPDATED: OCT 4, 2009 2009-10-01. Hazy brown, near headless. (3+) Aroma of leafy vegetation, hops, smells like fresh hop pellets. 7+ Flavour is likewise quite leafy and green. It tastes like sucking on hop pellets. Surprisingly not bitter actually considering the obvious hop presence, mild malt character is pretty much overwhelmed. Average palate is lightly carbonated. Lacks a cohesive vision, or rather the vision is dominated by green leaf hops, and your enjoyment of this will be entirely based on how much you like that profile. 7/3/6/3/13 - 3.2Hoppoatamonkey, On tap at C’est What

2009-07-30. No notes but this seemed a LOT more hoppy than my last sample. Interesting! On tap at Hart House

2009-07-22. Crisp orange amber body with a creamy beige head. (3+) Pleasant modest aroma, hoppy with sweet orangey citrus notes. (7+) Flavour has pleasant hop profile, sweet citrus, oranges, tangerines and a just a kiss of lemon. Mild malt base. (7+) Average palate is a touch light, but pleasantly smooth. Rather nice. Bit less assertive than expected but I enjoyed it. On tap at Cest What

on tap at the KW craft beer and rib fest. many, many samples of this, actually 6 out of my 11 samples were of this. pours amber with an off white head that stays. hoppy nose, man i love amarillo, with some backing malt structure. the flavour is exactly what the nose led me to believe. bursting with hop flavour but not very bitter. best beer of the fest IMO. cant wait to see it hit stores.

UPDATED: MAY 15, 2010 On tap at the KW OCB/ribfest. Pours a nice slightly hazy dark amber. Very nice aroma here, ample hoppy goodness matched perfectly with some toffee malts and dry earthy aspects. Flavour is a bit of a mixed bag, a tad watery with some mild malty sweetness, very dry on the finish but in a hoppy way, not earthy. Lacks balance. Palate is light as I was led to expect. Almost seems like a mild ale to me. A bit rough around the edges at this point, but it’s still extremely sessionable and tasty, and a huge step up IMO from the Roberty Simpson days. I look forward to buying this at the LCBO. In bottle form it’s just as good, and has a remarkable amount of hop activity without the IBU’s being there, which I can appreciate. Very well done. EDIT: Hop activity seems to have been tweaked lately for the better. On tap I get a very pleasant cannabis-like quality. This truly is one of the single best things being made in our otherwise cowardly and boring provincial brewing scene.

Dark amber. active head. Starts off a bit rough aroma with grains ans solvent, which seems to dissipate as the glass a few minutes. Taste loads of grassy hop bitterness, which is a bit unbalanced at first, but tastes decent with my Bison Burger. The sweet malts and fruit seem to come through later.

Tap sample from the brewery: Deep amber lightly hazed ale with a decent cap that lasts. Aroma is sweet malts with a distinct Amarillo hop aroma - spicey citrus. Lovely dose of biscuity malts in the fron are instantly matched by a pine-citrus resinous hop rush, creamy mouth feel, drying finish gets mildly bitter. Nice ! If I closed my eyes I’d have thought I was drinking a Propeller pale ale..

Draught at C’Est What Spring Festival. Pours a slightly hazy orange-amber with an average size somewhat-lasting creamy off-white head. Nice hoppy aroma, resiny and lightly spicy, backed by sweet malt. Flavour’s also nice, follows the aroma and is hoppier then expected. Long bitter finish. Average bodied. I quite enjoyed this -- well done!

Label-less pre-release bottle from the brewery courtesy of pfriesen. The bottle caps say Robert Simpson too, so the label changing must still be in its infancy. An orange amber coloured ale. This has moderate carbonation and a half inch off white head. There’s some grapefruit, orange, grass in the aroma with some underlying light maltiness. The mouthfeel is pretty smooth and light in body. There’s a fair amount of bready malt with a quick burst of grapefruit, some nice fresh hop flavours with mild bitterness, then melon leading to a bit of a watery finish. Hops hover on the tongue a fair bit after a sip. A keeper.

Draught. At C’Est What Spring Fest. Clear amber with a small creamy off-white head. Decent floral aroma against light cereal grain - moderately hoppy; clean. More bitterness in the flavour, fairly intense marigold pungency, dry, the malt is a touch sweeter than I expected. Average body, nicely carbonated, quite crisp, refreshing and dry, the linger lasts acceptably long - a pretty solid effort, would be a good pitchers on the patio brew.