Legend Hopfest

Brewed by Legend Brewing Company
Style: India Pale Ale (IPA)
Richmond, Virginia USA

Serve in Shaker, Tulip

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Pours copper with a two-finger white head. Pine and citrus in the aroma, with some soapiness. A little spicy, as well. Some malt aromas, but the hoppiness is dominant. Very spicy flavor, with more grassiness and sweet malt notes than I found in the aroma. Great hop bitterness in the finish, but the hop flavor in the beginning and middle is a little too spicy for this one to be more than quite good. Good, slightly oily mouthfeel.

Bottle. Pours a translucent copper with a fluffy tan head. Nose is assertively hopped. Nice spice profile to this along with light pine, grapefruit and orange peel. Some buttery malts as well. Taste is spicy hops and along with some earthiness, orange peel, light toffee, grapefruit, light lemon juice, and buttered bread. Body is oily and bitter with mild astringency and some bubbly carbonation. Finishes with more orange, grapefruit, lemon drops, light toffee and spicy hops. Very nice IPA, but like their 10th Anniversary beer, I think they should have gone bigger.
Earlier Rating: 7/2/2004 Total Score: 3.5
Pours a hazed copper with a medium white head. Aroma is pure hops and citrus. Bit of underlying sugary sweetness too. The hop flavors are up in front and a very dominant. The taste seems more pine than citrus and is more bitter than the aroma would lead you to believe. Not much sweetness or malt to balance it out a bit. Truly one for hops lovers! Essentially this is hop juice. Mouthfeel is a bit astringent and it feels as if my mouth has been cleaned after drinking it. Finish is bitter with more hop flavors. Not too bad a beer but one dimensional. ***Re-rate - Had this on cask at the Capital Ale House on 7/18/04. This is almost an entrirely different beast on cask. Much less of a "pure hop juice" and way more a balanced beer. Definite sweetness from the malt coming through. Much smoother as well. Sure, it's still over-the-top hoppy, but this is much nicer via cask than the bottle version could hope to be. Therefore, I must tweaked my rating a bit from the somewhat low 3.1 to whatever it ends up being.

Deep amber color much like an American IPA. Nice carbonation and thick head. Orange citrus and evergreen on the nose and quite bitter on the palate. This beer like many of Legend’s recent brews lacks considerable body and interesting qualities. Not bad by any means but I would look elsewhere for a more solid IPA.

22 oz bomber. Pours deep amber to a copper with an inch of head. Hoppy aroma- with some malt mixed in. Very nice flavor... decent balance between malts and hops, with earthy hops pushing forward. I like this one.

This came in a 22oz bomber. Pours out a clear copper color with a tall off white rocky head peaking over the top of the glass. A decent sized head remained on the body for the duration of this beer and it left scattered clumps of lace as it was consumed. Smell was of light earthy hops mostly with a touch of citrus to it. The flavor started of with a prickly bitter citric hop bite that lead into earthy and piney notes. Some caramel malt in the middle helped to balance out the hops. Aftertaste was bitter and dry. Mouthfeel was medium with a clean crisp feel to it. Pretty good drinkability as well, I would have had more if I picked it up

Really nice ale. Thanks to to Kinz for the SS delivery. Hazy, deep golden with a huge meringue-like head that left slowly leaving a nice lacing on the glass. Looks like apple cider almost. Nose is heavy grapefruit which I love. Reminds me of the Rogue Brutal Bitter but not nearly as bitter. Little bit fruity - Granny Smith appley. Nice hop texture and depth. I could drink this anytime, anywhere. Must experience more of this Legend brewery I have been introduced to.

Bottle: Short lived white head on a hazy deep gold/light amber body. Herbal and grassy hop aromas; lightly citrusy hop as well. Low, lighly toasty malt aroma & very low fruitiness. Hints of solventy alcohol as it warms. Lghtly bitter w/ a hint of sourness. Herbal hop & toasted malt flavor in good balance, but has hints of sulphury yeast. Finish is dry & hop flavored as is the aftertaste. Dry m/f w/ a medium carbonation & lighter medium body. Slight Alc. warming in the mouth. Pleasantly bitter overall! All flavors balance each other well...would seem like a good session beer less the alcohol content.

I can’t comment on the aroma or appearance because I was not at home and had to drink it out of the bottle. I have always loved legends, and they do not dissapoint on this one. Hoppy as can be. I can see how a lot of people would not like this beer or think the malts and hops arnt balanced enough, but I love hoppy IPAs... so I thought this was incredible. Maybe it is just because of local brewery pride, but I have never had a dissapointing Legends beer.

Sampled a draft @ Capital City Ale House (Richmond, VA) - Pretty slightly reddish light brown. Tiny, vanishing head. Very dry aftertaste. I sense that infamous "Generic Microbrew Flavor" that I absolutely HATE in this brew. Extremely filling. Smooth on the tongue & throat, but gives me the weighed down feeling in my gut. I might try again, but I found nothing noteworthy in this beer except for the baffling name of which is basically imperceptible upon drinking: hops.

Fairly clear copper color with an off-white edge head. Grapefruity aroma comes alive as it warms. Strong bready and toffee malt character with earthy and astringent mouth puckering hop flavors to match. Clean finish. Interestingly, there are no bittering hops in this beer. All hop additions occurred within the last 15 minutes of the 90 minute boil, with the exception of dry hopping. Very interesting.