Berried deep

Hello My Name Is Vladimir is the first of BrewDog's Hello My Name Is... series to have come my way. They're double IPAs with a berry addition and this time it's limonnik doing the honours.

It's a fairly clear orangey-pink colour, with just a very fine haze suspended evenly through it. There are strong Lilt-ish mango vapours which I don't know whether to assign to the berries or the hops, and behind them a sterner piney smell from the Citra. And it's the Citra leading the charge in the flavour: a strong spicy bitterness, lots of oily dank, and a lighter spritzy finish. There's a red berry complexity in amongst it, not quite hidden but struggling to be felt, while there's just enough caramel malt to provide a comfortable base to launch the hops. For an 8.2% ABV pale ale the texture is mercifully light and overall it's very drinkable; almost refreshing, in fact.

The twist in this IPA-with-a-twist is a subtle one, but the base beer is good enough to enjoy even if it passed the drinker unnoticed.

Thanks to Steve for the bottle.