Weyerbacher Eleven

Formerly brewed at Weyerbacher Brewing Co.
Style: Imperial/Double IPA
Easton, Pennsylvania USA

Serve in Snifter, Tulip

Bottle. Poured a cloudy orange/brown creamy yellowish head that leaves good lacing. Nice hoppy/malt mix in the aroma with a slight hint of alcohol. The flavor has great malt presents with chocolate and caramel standing out. Hoppy background with a hint of spices. Light alcohol in the flavor also. Fully body, sticky yet smooth, warming, and light bitterness. (Rating from June ’07)

bottle. hazy copper, woody color pour with huge froth bomb of a head. beautiful lacing from start to finish. huge aroma of perfume hops, apricot, pulpy citrus, rich carmel and burnt sugars. Big! nutty, musky wood. This might be where the hop shortage started. The malting is also enormous and unique. caramel, coffee, burnt. bitter hops give way to malts but outlast malts into finish. dry citrus in the end. Large in every sip. Interesting beer.

I really didn’t know what to make of this. I was left with an impression that it was really, really different, and not in a bad way, but also not in an exceptional one. This beer is murky and bitter in a weird way that is not harsh (as advertised) but I kind of miss some of this hop harshness; that is sort of essential component of bitter. However, I will say that this malt (& hop) bomb is intensely smooth and imparts a unique flavor. Good, I just don’t know quite what to make of it. It was very murky - like there was a lot of sediment suspended all the way through it. Aroma is very earthy; most beers have this as implied; here earthy is very pronounced. There is a ton of malt and hops in the flavor, although the hop flavor is muted - it is bitter yet smooth like no other hoppy beer I’ve had. Mouthfeel is exceptionally smooth. Flyer was kind enough to split this with me...no idea where he got it from.

Pours cloudy, orange/brown, with a thin, fine, white head. Aroma is strongly hoppy with an almost nutty or olive quality to it. Some fruitiness there. Full mouth feel with a strong bitterness. Almost a salty quality. It’s almost like eating an acorn. A bit much.

Lemon-citrus and field berry fruitiness in the earthy nose. Plenty of underlying toasty malt sweetness and a fair bit of alcohol round out the aroma. Opaque tan body is topped by a low tan fine bubbled head that recedes to cover. Plenty of hop flavour evokes lemongrass and wood with a floral-lavender character also. Once this passes, the huge malt sweetness and obvious alcohol are apparent. Still it manages to balance these nicely and although it is certainly extreme, it brings the flavours together well. Medium body with strong, engaging carbonation. Bottle sampled at Oakes’ Xmas tasting 2007.

This is the most extreme ipa I’ve ever encountered. The aroma is something of an active southernstill. The taste had an alcohol burn something like what I caught from that vegas stripper. Overall though, I have to rate this well, because of the balls this beer has.

22 oz. bomber poured into a pint glass. A big off-white head. Very cloudy orange. A pleasant wild grass/flower aroma lures you in, but then a hop profile so huge it’s almost medicinal comes in to slap your tongue around. Not sure if that’s a good thing. I’ve been drinking a lot of grapefruity west coast ipas lately, so this was an eye opener. Reading the description of a British flavor profile makes sense. There’s a certain balsa wood and prune flavor in there. This is challenging my idea of ipas. I think I like it.

on tap, Hop Devil, New York. frighteningly easy to drink given the strength. Well balanced, yet with almost over the top hops. Now this is what an IPA should taste like, not some bland 4% shite (Gr**n* K*ng kindly take note)