Lagunitas Sonoma Farmhouse Hop Stoopid

Brewed by Lagunitas Brewing Company
Style: Imperial/Double IPA
Petaluma, California USA

About a 1 inch thick head of fine and dense bubbles. Light carbonation. FANTASTIC aroma loaded with mandarin oranges, pineapple and all things citrus. Absolutely amazing! I just want to start drinking this brew. Color is a nice clear dark orange. A little bit frothy in the mouth. Slightly sweet malts, lots of hops bitterness, more citrus fruit and some bready malts. With claiming over 100 IBU’s I expected this brew to be bitter beyond belief and more similar to a Stone Ruination ale. This is very drinkable and goes down super easy! It is not leaving a dry pasty feeling in the mouth like some other IIPA’s. Light alcohol presence. Finishes a bit on the malty side with some lingering bitterness and dryness. A very, VERY good IIPA, that is super easy to drink and very affodable for the quality.

22 oz bottle. Clear light golden pour with a moderate off white head. Nice hop aroma, piney, citrusy and strong. Flavor is more of the same, nice caramel sweetness up front with a strong bitter hoppy finish. An exceptional beer.

Bottle: Poured a bright orangey color ale with large foamy head with great retention and perfect lacing. Aroma of floral hops with great notes of grapefruit. Taste is also a very well balanced mix between some floral hops with citrus and grapefruit ester with a subtle bitter finish. Body is quite full with great carbonation and no signs of alcohol. What a surprise and what a great mix between slightly sweet malt with great hoppy presence while not overtaking the beers and more profile then just bitterness.

Pours with a three-finger thick head that was poured a touch too vigorously as it over-flows the top of my glass. The beer is a brilliantly clear, reddish tinged, copper color. Luckily a heavenly nectar of hop concentrate greets my nose as I pour this; it is a mix of orange blossoms, intensely sweet aromatic notes of ruby red grapefruit, tangelo and lychee. I may be a bit tipsy right now, but this aroma is just so freshly vibrant, intoxicating and freshly hoppy that I just have to spend some dedicated time enjoying the aromatics wafting from this tipple. Hints of pine, and a certain rank hop character form the secondary wave of the hop attack, while not quite reminiscent of its closest cousin, it certainly has a certain dank quality that is at least evocative of it. Wait, there it is; there towards the end, notes of hemp seeds, menthols and a certain, easily placed, aromatic, essential oil. Egad, the aroma is perfectly exquisite; so much so that I am almost certain that the flavor cannot live up to the odoriferous emanations from the surface of this brew. So what do I do, well I’ll just have to spend a few moments more enjoying the aroma. It is really interesting, at first the fruity citrus hop notes were what dominated the aromatics, but now the rank, herbaceously, pernicious weed character is what is most distinctive, though the citrus character still plays a prominent role. You really can’t ask more from the aroma of a hop focused beer.

The first sip is creamy up front, it is quite smooth; after all this time smelling the brew a lot of the carbonation has mellowed. It is not quite as hoppy as the aroma suggest, but it is darn near there. The hop flavor is a mix of citrus notes and green, herbal notes. I get flavors of bergamot, ruby-red grapefruit, tangelo, lychee, apricot and other-sort-of tropical fruit like notes, plus I also get notes of basil, menthol and some savory herbal notes reminiscent of its persnickety cousin. At times the herbal notes take on characteristics of garlic, green onions, freshly cut savory herbs. The beer is quite drinkable, light, but with enough heft to carry the ample hop character. There is enough malt sweetness that the citrus notes stick to the palate in the finish. A solid bitterness runs throughout this beer; strangely enough it never gets astringent and is quite clean for a beer that has been obviously been hopped this much. The particulary rank almost garlic-like character must come from Summit hops.

While the flavor of this brew does not quite live up to the aromatics emanating from this beer, this is certainly the most enjoyable brew I have ever had from Lagunitas (though I should warn you that it may take a particular breed, a hop head certainly, to enjoy the characteristics of this brew. I wonder how much of my enjoyment of this brew is situational? I’ll definitely have to try this again, but it is really hitting the spot right now; this is the last beer after a night of drinking malt focused brews. While my head may certainly be feeling the effects of the alcohol content, the aroma and flavor hide it amazingly well and make me think that I could quaff this brew pints at a time; a dangerous situation I might almost feel lucky enough to experience until the next morning. I am quite pleased; it is rare that the beer I end up with at the end of a night of a rating marathon (anything over three beers qualifies for me), is the best brew of the night. In fact I better score this beer now, as the longer I drink this and the more the alcohol effects me, the higher it score is going to rise. Actually on that note, this makes me think that I need to revist a lot of beers from my ratings past so that I can down-grade them.

Pours a clear amber color with a small off white head. Wonderful citrus/grapefruit aromas. You can also smell some caramel malt backing, but not too much. Flavor is of pure hop juice! Great citrus/grapefruit flavorsthat end in a bitter finale! Not too much of a malt backing, just some hidden sweetness in there. Great brew!

Sonoma Farmhouse Hop Stoopid Ale by Lagunitas, which is quite a mouthful for a moniker, came in a 22 oz. brown bomber with a rustic scene on the label to match the name. I usually love the way IPAs look, and this one did not disappoint with a clear gold, bubbly body, holding up a two finger thick head. The smell was citric hops with a small dose of pine resin. I was expecting the taste to be like their Maximus, but this was a lot more assertive with an up front bitterness, toasty caramel malt, and a lingering finish. The body was a little thin for DIPA, but that’s hardly ever the point of the style anyway. Not sure why this is described as a "traditionally brewed non-traditional ale" on the label, but some traditions are well worth keeping any ways.

Tap at Hop Devil Grill. Very pale golden with a thin white head. Served with a dried hop flower on top... not that you need any reminding that more than a few hops died making this brew. A huge initial slap of fresh fruity hops with a soft underlying spiciness. Very fresh and spicy, apricot and mango with lots of soft fruity hop oils. Orange peel, grapefruit and loads of sticky sweet hops. Flavour is great, not a lot of bitterness or resinousness, but certainly enough to balance the lean pale malts. Soft carbonation that accentuates the tropical hop sweetness. Awesome.

This was an awesomely pleasant find on tap at Kuma’s. Deep amber colored, amazing hop nose of flowers and fruit, some nice tropical fruit. Beautiful nose. Taste is interesting in that it has a taste of wonderful tropical taste as well, very smooth and eloquent bitterness. So tightly put together, it’s hard to figure out how they did it. Awesome.