Willimantic Pushing the Envelope Extreme

Enjoyed a 12 oz glass of this beer on draught at the brewpub in Willimantic, CT. This brewpub continues to amaze me with the quality and variety of the beers being brewed there. I don’t think an Imperial IPA could get any better than this beer. This beer has tremendous hop aroma, hop flavor, and hop bitterness. It has a firm malt back bone, and good malt character to match up to that hop assault, and makes for one amazingly good beer. Pushing the Envelope Extreme pours to a deep golden to light amber color, with a thick, creamy, white head, and a moderate carbonation. The nose on this beer is just fantastic, with very fragrant and zesty, grapefruit hop aroma. The palate is firm and sligtly oily on the tongue, with lots of good pale and biscuit malt flavor, paired with a very apparent, very tasty, "candied" lemon/grape fruit hop flavor. This beer finishes with more pale malt and candied lemon/grapefruit flavor, then ends with a very long, very dry, very bitter grape fruit and lemon peel, and piney bitterness that lingers for quite some time. Fresh, delicious, appetizing beer, this beer is the ultimate aperitif, and is one hop cocktail of a brew. The 8.8% abv is hiden well, with hints of alcohol heat in the finish, making this beer dangerously drinkable. One of the most impressive Imperial IPA’s I have tasted, and one of the most memorable beers I have had in quite some time.

Growler from kmweaver--thanks so much! I’ve waited a long time for this beer. Deep golden brown color with a nice white head. Aroma is pine and and lighter citrus. The taste is heavily hoppy with a bit of sweet malt mixed in. Some bready tastes as well. Great balance and flavor.

Tap at Pub and later from growler 3/14/06. Great nose, sweet. Citrusy, tangerine, orange. Hazy brownish orange color, small head, good lacing. Bittersweet. Citrus, pine, apricot, peach, (that fleshy friut thing) brown sugar. (MAN I wish I had one right now). Thick body, creamy oily mouthfeel bitter sweet finish. This is a great IIPA. If this was distributed it would easily be a top 50 beer. Had similiar thing as 3 Floyds hop signature. Brilliant!

Fresh as fresh can be in a nice 12 oz. glass. Very murky dark amber with a thin film of white head with good retention. Aroma is bursting with orange citrus and soft and sweet peach fruits. Flavor starts syrupy sweet with juicy tangerines and piney resins. Turns sharply bitter, with orange rinds and a light piney bitterness. 8.8% abv makes itself known here and there, but is never offensive. Finishes smooth and sweet, an incredibly juicy DIPA.

Less than 3 hour old growler shared by OldGrowth on 3/14/06 in a tulip, chilled to start
Intensely bright orange-amber body, with apricot and peach tones, perfect mix of deep and light shades. Huge, perfectly constructed, dense white head. Perfect retention (recedes slightly to become manageable) and laces in large sheets. Lightly hazy, unfiltered
Tropical fruits galore with wintergreen and spearmint on the end. Clean, very crisp and fresh. Nectarine-papaya-mango fruits with light herbs, very juicy and Pliny the Younger-esque. You can almost taste how juicy the flavor is going to be. Simcoes done to perfection. And fortunately, not too heavy on the columbus. Malt is just a basic pale malt with touches of light caramel/munich influences, but nothing heavy. Yet nor is it underrepresented. Just enough to add balance/body, but allows the hops free range. The aroma is, furthermore, very intense, strong and lasting. Some 30 minutes or so later and every sniff is just as intense and beautiful as the first.
The flavor delivers and then some. Huge, complex hop profile explodes on the palate with fruit juiciness covering every inch of taste receptors. Not quite as much tropical fruits as the aroma would suggest, but nonetheworse, it brings light wintergreen and some medium-dry pine resin. Softly-sweet pale malts add a balancing sweetness and wonderful body/texture, with traces of caramel here and there. But it’s a hop show, from start to finish. Importantly, not overly bitter or resinous in the least. The pine is there, but only comes out on the very end, with a bit of perfuminess or alcohol esters. Sweet and fruit juicy, but yet retains an inexplicable dryness that makes for one of the most drinkable beers I have ever experienced. A lighter version of Pliny the Younger not quite as floral as Hop 15 and maybe not as much tropical fruit, alcohol and malt sugar as Pliny. But the lower alcohol makes it that much more manageable on the palate. Extremely tight, engaging carbonation gives an intensely creamy-spritzy mouthfeel.
A shame this is a draught only brewpub version from the middle of nowhere CT. This needs to be experienced by everyone. Thanks so much Tom!