HeBrew Bittersweet Lennys R.I.P.A

Shmaltz Brewing Company
Brewed at Olde Saratoga Brewing (Mendocino Brewing Co.)
Style: Imperial/Double IPA
San Francisco, California USA

Sample at Barley’s Smokehouse. The beer is a dark amber-brown color with a medium and frothy light beige head that has good retention. Sheets of lacing on the glass. The aroma is an odd mishmash of pungent malt, whiskey, and piney hops. Rich, syrupy body with flavors of tart fruit, liqueur, toasted malt and dry hops. The finish is dry with fruity a cough medicine and rye aftertaste. Maybe I am not appreciating what they tried to do here but the beer seems to be lacking cohesiveness.

22oz, maybe my favorite style is shifting from IIPA’s but this one is just funky, not a bright citrus flavor that caused me to love IIPA’s but rather a deep down bracingly bitter taste that overwhelms the palate... too much of a good thing perhaps??? not bad by any stretch and very drinkable, but just not floral or anything i like about IIPA.

Cloudy amber’ish dark tan pour. A definitely different take on a double ipa. The rye malt gives the beer a different flavor, rather than your usual hoppy bitterness usually associated with a dboule ipa. Initial bitterness at the tip of the tongue quickly smooths into a full mouthfeel, but not thick. Very pleasant, & no discernible alcohol.

8th Big Beers, Belgians, and Barleywines. Pours clear orange with a small, frothy, off-white head, diminishing with fair lacing. Aroma is heavy malt (bread, grain, meal), heavy hops (flowers, pine, spruce, citrus), average yeast (sweat, earth) with notes of alcohol, apples, and pears. Full bodied, creamy texture, average carbonation, and a bitter finish. Long duration, light sweetness, heavy acidity and bitterness.

Solid brew. poured out a deep copper color with a small off white head. aroma was strong. had hops and citrus notes to it and i could really pick out the rye. I thought this thing smelled great. Flavor had a lot of malt to it with a fair amount of hops. finish was clean and lasting. couldnt detect the 10% here at all. great job.

First off, this bottle must have sit for a while. When I popped it, there was barely any compressed CO2 in the bottle. I poured from the 22 oz and there was barely any head. But the first flavor was an utterly smooth, yet very hoppy and rye-ish flavor. Unlike Hop Rod Ale, this one is not in your face. It’s mellow, soft and beautiful. Aging this one it definitely mellows, so that any harshness that might have existed before hand have mellowed and made this into a beautiful 10-11% brew.

On tap. Pours a copper color with a nice dense tan colored head. Aroma is grapefruit, pine, caramel. Flavor is intense blast of grapefruit, spicy pine like notes, floral hops, malt. Palate is medium bodied, medium carbonation, finished with a biting bitterness. Very good.

A solid idea, I’ve always been fond of Hop Rod Rye and think american hops meet a fine complement when in touch with rye. Here, they went for the big showdown. Like 10 different types of malts and 10 different types of hops. And the result is amazingly ordinary. You need to pour very straight to obtain a minimal cover that fades out quickly enough. Dark orangey red coloured, totally clear. Strong crystal malts nose with lots of residual sugariness, fruit salad and syrupy notions. Syrupy indeed in mouth. For such a heavily filtered beer, the texture is of course syrupy, but not catastrophically hot. he chewiness seems natural enough and while the alcohol is present indeed, it does not dominate. The malts do however, more than the hops which procure a basic bitterness (sided by grapefruity aromatics) that still has ways to go before competing with the sugary malts. Limited rye influence, the shy spiciness might just as well originate from the hops. A testament to the pressure to go bigger.