Sunday, May 31, 2009

A Tale of Two Lagunitas Brews

Lagunitas is a brewery based out Petaluma California. One of the reason's why I enjoy them so much is that they make some really good beers that are extremely well priced. Many times you can get a bomber of their beers for around 4 bucks, which is pretty low compared to other similar beers. Recently my local Spec's has had two new versions of their beer. Their easy for me to pick up because worst case even if I don't like it, I haven't invested that much money in it. Over the last couple of day's I've been able to try both of these new beers.
Hop Stoopid: This is their Imperial IPA and imperial it is weighing in at 8% and 102 IBU's. It pours a bright orange with a thin white head. Hops are all over the nose here, floral and citrus. The first sip is an absolute explosion of hops dancing across the tongue. A medium body with little malt balance, but loads of citrus peel, grapefruit, hints of wild floral flavors. Its lip puckering hoppy and resinous. A great bargain DIPA. This thing saturates the tongue in hops. Its really quite a good DIPA that gets an A- from me. Lots of BA love for this one.
2009 Correction Ale: As the label says THIS IS NOT A DIPA. That doesn't mean it doesn't have hops though. It weighs in at 74.2 IBU's and 6.33 % abv. It pours a pale copper color with a good white head of foam. Hoppy bitterness on the nose a bit of citrus and an earthiness to the hops, a different nose then Hop Stoopid. The mouthfeel is a little thin on the first sip. But boy is it bitter, resinous, astringent. There is a hint of Windex in this beer. The hops are way over the top, but I don't get any of the good grapefruit or citrus peel instead I get heavy doses of astringency and that's about all. No real depth or other flavors to speak of. No malts, nothing. A bit of a disappointment this gets a C from me. Not a drain pour, but not something I'll try again. The Hop Stoopid on the other hand has now become my go to DIPA especially for the price. As for the correction ale, the folks at BA liked it more than I did.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Did you try them back to back? If so, I'd recommend a re-review of the Correction ale, with that first, or by itself.

It's totally better than a C...

Barleyvine said...

Seth,
Tried each beer on seperate days. I had not had a beer before trying the Correction Ale, and since it came in the big bottle format I tried a taste of it, finished that glass and then went back for more and still had the astringency with really no citrus hop flavor.