Mikkeller Stateside India Pale Ale / IPA

Split this one with Ross tonight. Poured out a light orange color with a decent white head on it. Aroma is basically you lawn right after you have cut it, very grassy and kinda of sweet. The taste was interesting, more grassy flavors mixed with sugars than a refreshing citrus flavor. I did suggest that this was dominated by simcoe hops but apparently I was wrong seeing that simcoe is not in this beer. Maybe it is the amarillo I didn’t care for then, something about this beer turned me off and it was definatley the hop profile, way to grassy for me. I say turned me off but really all and all this wasn’t a bad beer just not as good as I had hoped.

Bottle split with Garrett. Pours out a orange - yellow color with a white head on it. Smell is hoppy, grassy, full of seemingly one hop. (couldnt place a name on it, Garrett guessed simcoe, but I am not into hops enough to know the answer.) Taste is sweet and grassy yet plenty flavorful and still refreshing. However, as a tribute to an "American style IPA", I would have expected it to be more so like an American IPA. It is good, and its drinkable, but for the price tag, it should be a double IPA if anything. This doesnt hold a candle to Two Hearted or even Hop Devil, but it is a very nice easy drinking IPA. My glass was gone before I knew it.

16.9 oz bottle. Pours a hazy golden orange with a smal creamy white head that retains well and leaves some lacing.

The aroma is bready malts, and minty melon.

The flavor is some sweet caramel malts followed by a big slightly harsh bitter finish. The mouthfeel is medium with low carbonation.

Overall, a decent IPA with good bitterness but just OK aromatics and taste. There are much better (and more cost effective at $9 for 16.9 oz) IPAs out there.

Courtesy of Degarth. Pours a crystal clear copper with white head and sheet lacing. Big aroma with an up front attack of sweet malts and fresh grapefruit hops mixed with orange juice. The taste starts with sweet malts, roasty malts and sweet tasting late addition grapefruit to orange citrus hop flavor. The citrus hop bitterness builds as the taste moves forward with a nice undercurrent of caramelized malty sweetness. Grapefruit, orange rind and orange juice take the experience well into the aftertaste.

Bottle. Pours a clear copper with a small white head that fades to a ring and leaves some lacing. Aroma of citrus hops, sweet malt, pine hops, and a hint of sweet caramel. Taste is the same as aroma. Medium full slightly resiny mouthfeel with a strong amount of bitterness. Very good.

Golden orange. Fluffy white ring of head leaves sparse lace. Earthy yeast aroma is capped with honey, aspirin, stewed apricots, pinesap, Munich malt, and grapefruit pith. Both flowery and herbal with a hint of oxidation (sherry). Touch of plastic. Loose prickles of carbonation. Bottle conditioned. Fairly brash and unclean from the start, as tongue-gripping hops deposit notes of assorted citrus pith and a dash of spicy pine. Heavily oily and moderately acidic. Earthy yeast fuses with the mild but perceptible hop-derived woodiness to bring more firmness to the body while augmenting the dryness. Malts contribute plenty of balancing sweetness with a sweet wafer and weighty pound-cake effect, but are fairly dull and unrefined. Grapefruit peel bitterness stings the tip of the tongue while the dense resinous weight both saturates and tugs heavily at the back of the palate. Hops are quite dull and particularly devoid of explosiveness as well as brightness. Quite muddled and overly busy, which totally clashes with the equally busy maltiness. Finish is chock full of honey-drizzled pound cake (and overly sweet and wet as a result) though a pinpoint sharpness reminiscent of lemon zest manages to impart a negligible amount of quenching acidity which helps to offset some of the busy maltiness and hoppiness. Yet another dime-a-dozen IPA as far as I’m concerned. Given the name, however, I’d say they’re right on target. Just isn’t my thing. Dully hoppy, overly resinous, unclean, brash, etc. This fresh bottle is curiously oxidized, and oxidation is the worst enemy of such a beer that largely relies on brightness.

Bottle. Poured orange-amber, with a small off-white head. Grapefruity hop aroma, with a fair amount of malt in the background. Fairly big citric hop flavor. Long bitter finish, with some metallic character. Not bad, but not great.

50 cl bottle from LS - Pours a hazy amber color with a one and a half finger thick off white head. Light lacing. Aroma is pine, citrus and light esters. Flavor is full of hops with a light toasted malt background. Palate is intially bitter. Medium body. A good beer.