John Harvards Old Willy IPA

On tap at Club 3000, PNC Park. Nice hoppy aroma, fresh and grassy. Mild malt caramel. Dark amber clear with a bit of haze, topped with off-white creamy lacing head. Medium body and carbonation and easy drinking. Starts with caramel malty character, good sweetness before the grassy fresh hops come, juicy and bitey. A bit of harsh grapefruit bitter at the end, but otherwise finely balanced and very refreshing.

Sampled on draft at the brewery this beer poured a dark caramel-amber color with a small khaki head. The aroma was sweet grapefruit. The flavor was bitter grapefruit with a light sweet nutty malt base underneath and a long grapefruity finish. Nice.

On tap at Kelly’s Bar, Pittsburgh. This beer is a part of the supposed "Wet Hop Festival." Dubbed Fresh Hop IPA for this version with "wet hops."

From Steve Sloan, head brewer at John Harvards: "The fresh hop IPA was basically our Old Willy IPA that was "wet-hopped" with 22 lbs of freshly picked cascade hops from Pedersen Farms in Upstate NY. This gives the nice floral character to the beer. We normally "dry hop" the IPA with 6 lbs of previously kilned hops which gives the beer a more citrusy quality. A good amount of caramel malt is added to the IPA to balance the high bitterness (80 bitterness units) from the use of 5 different varieties of hops during the brewing process, thus resulting in a sweeter version of IPA. Alcohol by volume is approx. 6.5%"

Dark caramel ruby, off white head. Aroma is tangerine, kiwi, caramel, vanilla (quite smooth and sweet). Flavor is hoppy with walnuts, maple syrup ice cream and some lingering bitterness. Quite an unusual flavor.

This is undoubtedly the darkest IPA I have ever sampled. Quite an impressive appearance for an IPA. At first I thought perhaps it come from the wrong tap. Dark brown and hazy, looks something like a dunkel weizen! After one taste however, I knew this was an IPA, no mistake. The floral hops aromas are also outstanding. Tho an IPA, it is a little milder than most. Not quite as brutal in the chewy oppressive grapefruit rind arena. But surely, this is IPA, not APA. I would imagine that most heavy duty IPA lovers will rate this low due to it’s mildness, but I find it rather acceptable. Probably one of the more mannered IPAs I’ve had the pleasure of tasting. I would put this on par with the likes of Bells Two Hearted, Magic Hat Hi PA, Tröegs Nugget Nectar Ale and Victory HopDevil, but this is just my humble opinion.