Russian River Pliny the Elder

Brewed by Russian River Brewing
Style: Imperial/Double IPA
Santa Rosa, California USA

Glass- Tripel Karmeliet Tulip Temp- 49 degrees A- The head is tight and cream colored, about 1/2in. It is a nice golden raw honey color and unfiltered. S- The first thing I get is citrus and pine! It starts out grapefruit and pine needles that transitions into pine and tangerine. Awesome! M- The mouth feel is very nice, it’s not too light, actually almost creamy. D- Great carbonation that has a piney, peppery and hoppy finish. It is a wonderful dry finish that allows you to enjoy this great IPA without the expected heaviness. Ironically this is not my favorite type of beer and happens to be my first review. I am now a huge fan!

16.9oz bottle from Tony’s wines in Littleton, bottled 051309. One of the best-looking beers out there in the glass. Starts with a hint of citrus that are soon balanced by light toasted caramel malt. The taste is then Grapefruit, tangerine, and wonderfl flowery hops...really crisp, really complex, bitter/spicy/floral/sweet/sour at the same time. All the flavors play so well with eachother, and it stays short of the super-bitter IIPA pine needle bomb. I could (and have) drink many of these in a sitting. Top 5 beer for me. ************************************************** Re-Rate Nov5, 2009 - So, I pretty much don’t pass up Pliny when I see it at home, but the best I can do is about 4 weeks old. Picked up a couple today in Socal @ 2 weeks so thought I’d add a re-rate. The dank, resinous, sticky profile is SO much more pronounced in just that short of a time difference. Oily and deep citus pervades the first sip, with JUST enough malt to spread the grapefruit, lemon and pineapple flavors out. Bitter, dry (?) finish that makes me so want more. This beer, this fresh, has no equal for me. Slight uptick in rating as the aroma and overall effect are just that much better @ only 2 weeks old - next step - days old from the brewery (10,5,9,5,19)

16.9 oz bottle from mreusch, bottled on 02/03/09: lighter amber w/ a lasting off white medium sized head! Fantastic lacing! Lightly hazed, but still a good looking beer! Great hop aroma! Grapefruity, pineapple, grassy, and slighlty floral! Toasty malt, light caramel, but mostly hops! Fantastic hop combo! Very light fruitiness, mostly from hops! Very clean! Well balanced throughout start to finish! Clean hop flavor is citrusy and grassy, green/recently harvested if you will. Toasty malt takes a back seat, but it’s there and well represented. Caramel is also there, but in the background. Finish is on the dry side and most definitely clean, grassy and citrusy hop flavored. Medium bodied, smooth m/f, dry @ the finish, but very clean palate. I can see why this is highly rated! Very clean, very hoppy, but complex with hop varietals and very well balanced between hop bitterness and malt sweetness. Very nice beer with a big hop presence and well balanced flavor.

Appearance – This is definitely one of the best looking DIPAs I have ever seen. Pours a yellowish orange color with a large billowing white head that only has small traces of tan in it. As the head slowly recedes it leaves lacing that every DIPA should strive for; absolutely beautiful. Smell – Hops, hops, hops, and hops. This smells like if there were any malt in it, the hops already took the malt out back and beat the crap out of it. Good job hops! Very piney and floral with just a hint of citrus. The malt gives a little bit of a caramel scent rounding it out at the end, but in no way dominates this hop bomb in any way, shape, or form. Taste – This has a hop zing to it that isn’t overbearing but it lasts the test of time. It lets you know that the hops in this sucker are here to stay and will kick your ass just like they did the malt. It has a very strong piney taste to it. After the pine settles down a little bit the tangerines and grapefruit come out to play and they do it well. After all is said and done the malt is still struggling to make an appearance, but those hops are just relentless. Mouthfeel – This alone makes me want to take gulp after gulp of this amazing DIPA. Thick and resinous with lasting appealing. It feels like it envelopes your tongue like it just took it hostage. Drinkability – I would drink this daily if I could. Russian River really knows what they are doing when it comes to just about any style. Well played RR, well played.

Pours out a hazy gold with lots of head. Smells sweet and piney. Taste is more of the same. Good balance. Lots of citrus and floral flavors with bitter hop finish. Very tasty DIPA.

Hop bomb! What a delight. Had it in Berkley and had it again at the brewpub even though there were so many other delicious beers I hadn’t yet had. Pours a dark copper-y color and the aroma had wafts of citrus (namely grapefruit), and some floral notes as well. Under those aromas were some pine and overall goodness. As mentioned in prior posts, despite the all hop aroma all the time and the BIG hop taste, it didnt have the bitterness that sometimes a hop-bomb can have. The flavor was everything the aroma was, yet slightly more balanced. A suprisingly soft finish topped of this near-perfection beer. Loved it!

This beer was world class. Poured a nice hazy golden colro with a bit of a rocky white head. Aroma was straight up hops, a prefect blend of citrus, pine, grapefruit, the nose on this was magnificent. I wa sa little worried the flavor would be overly bitter in the way super hoppy beers can get, but this was like drinking a big glass of fresh hop juice. The hops flavor just exploded and flooded your mouth. This beer was bliss.

500mL bottle: Appearance is amber brown with slow fading off white head, aroma is strong in hops with hints of pale malt, flavor has a very strong taste of floral hops with almost no citrus bite but still very hoppy good malt backbone. Was looking for more out of this top 100 beer but none the less was still damn good.