Sunday 10 July 2011

An IPA a day #3

IPA number three in my lead up to International IPA Day is Great Divide Hercules Double IPA.
Great Divide are based in Denver, Colorado (Yep, I'm going there!!!) and their Double IPA comes in at a hefty 10% abv.
What you get from the bottle is a deep orange, classically tawny coloured beer which leaves a good head lacing your glass.
Bringing the glass to your face you get the aroma of piney hops along with a hit of citrus and surprisingly a hint of the malt sweetness on the back of that aroma too.
The Centennial, Columbus and Simcoe hops balance out with bitterness what would be an over the top sweetness made by the amount of malt that has to go into this bad-boy. For your mighty 85 IBU's(International Bittering Units) You get a resinous piney taste along with hints of Orange peel and the toffee malt character sweetness coats your mouth with a lovely boozy warmth to finish off the taste experience.
With such a weighty ABV, this is a beer that should be enjoyed with some sort of food, a hard, strong cheese or some sort of spicy dish that the beer can go head to head with!
First brewed in 2004 the recipe has not been tweaked once since it's inception and I put my hand on heart and thank the brewers at Great Divide for that!

4 comments:

Professor Pie-Tin said...

I don't normally drink pale ale or indeed any ale on account of it being virtually impossible to find in the beer wastelands of Southern Ireland.
But your current series has triggered an interest and last night I tried a bottle of Meantime Pale Ale.
A bit thin but very hoppy - almost like an American beer - but not bad at all,at all.
Keep up the good work Glen - it's my vicarious escape from the ocean of lager and stout that surrounds me.

rabidbarfly said...

PPT! Have you tried metalman? They rock!

Professor Pie-Tin said...

Certainly have old cock.
Their Windjammer on draught was superb a couple of weeks ago in Waterford.

rabidbarfly said...

Sorted geeza.