An experiment goes wrong

Larkin's popped out two single-hop IPAs a while back. I made the nerdy mistake of setting up a blind tasting to attempt to learn from them.

These things are often high drama, in my house anyway. This wasn't. The Larkin's Citra tasted unmistakably like a perfect expression of Citra: a herbal, funky, urinal-cake aroma leading on to lime shred and grapefruit juice. Zingy and resinous in equal measure; assertive yet friendly; I wished I'd just drank it instead of playing with it.

And the same, more-or-less, goes for Larkin's Mosaic: an aroma of spiced apricot then a smooth cantaloupe flavour backed by bitterer peach skin and a twist of white pepper. Comparison with Little Fawn is inevitable, and this is no Little Fawn -- it's bigger, and harder work, but still really good.

Both of these are superb showcases for their titular hops, pitched well in the middle at 5.5% ABV. Try to ignore the coldly technical names, and the urge to do experiments. They're built for enjoyment so do that, somewhere sunny.