Recently I was at a brewery with my lovely Frau enjoying a flight of beers as we awaited lunch. The gentleman who was sitting next to us chimed in at one point and asked if we liked one of the beers in our sampler. It turned out he was an employee of the establishment. Very friendly guy. At one point he recommended and commented upon the hazy IPA on the menu and I replied that, yes, it was a fine IPA…
FOR ME TO POOP ON!
Ha!
No, I was polite and remarked that American IPAs aren’t my thing or something akin to that and our conversation veered to the merits of other styles.
I am reminded of an exchange I had at another brewery - this one is here in Madison. I was getting refills for the three of us when the person behind the counter asked if I'd tried the double or extra cryo or mega-hazy or whatever variation of their flagship IPA. I politely informed this person that I don't drink IPAs.
This, of course, is a lie since you are reading a review of an IPA written by your humble narrator. It would have been more correct to have said that I don't drink American IPAs. Not totally correct, mind you, but this would have gotten us closer to the truth. And it would have gotten across the point that I am not interested in their fruity-tasting beers. Hence that pilsner clear as day in my order.
I guess pushing the trendiest of the trendy is just what you do when you work at a craft brewery these days.
After having had some extremely delicious nut brown ale by Samuel Smith, I thought I'd investigate what else they brew and started with their India Ale.
I can find no proof that Samuel Smith ever exported a pale ale to India back when the sun never set on the English Empire. The brewery's website notes that the bottle's label "is based on Samuel Smith’s Victorian letterhead when the brewery was a contractor to Her Majesty Queen Victoria’s forces." Are they avoiding noting that the brewery, however tangentially, aided and abetted imperialism? Or did they simply never send pale ale to India? Harumph.
The important bit for me is that this is an IPA brewed by honest-to-Christ British people and promised not to taste like the hideous union of Hawaiian Punch and Boone's Farm that, for me, is the hazy/juicy IPA, the fashionable variant of the venerable style.
No comments:
Post a Comment