Fuck me that title's a mouthful. I suppose that's unavoidable when you're doing a brewery mash-up release. Anyway, who gives a toss? They fit it on the can. This collaboration holds a lot of promise and I've been looking forward to tasting this drop all week.
As a relative newcomer to independent brews, Ballast Point first hove onto my palate with the Sculpin IPA. It's as tasty as buggery, fairly-priced and readily available (in cans moreover) from Dan's. (Sure, I'd link to Beer Cartel, Slow Beer or any number of smaller independent liquor sales specialists but their websites are a fucking disgrace. As soon as one of them manages to sort out their online shop to the extent that it isn't a fucking headache to search, find, click and buy a beer I'll happily link to a locally-owned and run vendor. Surely it can't be that hard?)
Ballast Point's Sculpin led me to whizz through a few more of their regular offerings: Grunion Pale; Pineapple Sculpin; Big Eye IPA; etc. They're all good but the bitter allure and seductively ineffable flavour of the hop draws me ever deeper into the world of the stronger IPAs. And so, Pirate Life.
These bastards ruined me forever with their pant-tighteningly tasty but painfully expensive IIPA. $40 a 4-pack?!? I mean, fuck the taxman right in the eye but surely things can't be that grim? Bugger it. That drop went straight to the ABV hall of fame too. It's so good that I'll keep parting with my reddies 'til it hurts. It's THAT good. Don't even start me on the bloody Mosaic IPA. Cripplingly good.
The upshot of all this is that expectations are high for this collaboration. As a former cicerone I know only too well that whenever expectations creep up, disappointment becomes almost inevitable. With this in mind I took a few deep breaths.
The long and the short of it is that this beer doesn't disappoint. Despite the altitudinous expectations, it's a beautifully hoppy, richly-flavoured beer. The coriander isn't overpowering and well-balanced by the finger lime citrus bite. In fact, it's so hoppy I'd probably call it an IPA in a blind taste test. Bloody delicious.
If only it came in bigger cans....
Comments
Post a Comment