Normcore

I've long been a fan of Denver's Crooked Stave brewery, specialising as it does in the sort of barrel-aged mixed fermented beer that I like. That it arrives here with a very reasonable pricetag is a bonus. Today is an occasional foray into the Crooked Stave interpretations of more mainstream beer styles. I'm prepared to give them all the benefit of the doubt.

First it's Juicy East, a hazy IPA of 6% ABV featuring Azacca, Citra, Mosaic and Motueka, for what should be a fun mix of hard bitterness and soft juice. It looks like the classy sort of New England IPA, being fully opaque and a pale yellowish orange. It smells quite citric, with a sharp lemon and lime buzz to the fore, but there's a hint of vanilla too. In keeping with that, the texture is creamy and there's a vanilla base to the flavour. The hop fruit builds on this, not quite fleshy and tropical but still sweet and spritzy, with elements of lemonade, pineapple juice and lime cordial. It's no world-shaker -- I've had many a beer very like it -- but it's still a good example of the hazy IPA genre, doing pretty much everything that they're supposed to.

The companion piece is the oxymoronic Juicy West, described on the can as "new west coast style" which I read as "not west coast style". It's less hazy than the last one, but still pretty hazy; a golden colour and again 6% ABV. The hops are a simplified combination of Simcoe, Citra and Mosaic which gives it a savoury and dank aroma. While it smells a bit all over the place the flavour is more coherent, showing an almost German herbal eucalyptus subtly blended with grapefruit, kiwifruit and melon rind. It works, and is very tasty. It's not at all west coast, but neither is it a sweet 'n' juicy New Englander. This hits a sweet spot between the two, as is entirely appropriate for a Denver brewer. Regardless of style minutiae, this is a quality beer well worthy of the Crooked Stave name and reputation.

Two stouts represent the other half of this set, both 6.5% ABV so I'm guessing have the same base with different adjuncts. The first one I opened is Vanilla Milk Stout. It looks nicely dense on pouring, black with a beige head. A pleasing coffee aroma suggests a dryness I wasn't expecting. It's not dry as such, however, but neither is it sickly sweet, something I was fully prepared for. I'm very much on board with balance in modern milk stout, all too rare a feature. The vanilla and dark malt give it a kind of crème brûlée character, with a small shot of espresso on the side. There's even a faint hop bite for some properly old-fashioned stout charm. This is lovely, as much at home as a preprandial as an aperitif. It's weighty but not any way overdone. Again the Crooked Stave class shines through.

Can they top this with a Toasted Coconut Coffee Stout? The head seems a little paler on this, though the rest is just as black. The aroma is definitely sweeter, and although I wouldn't be able to immediately identify it as coconut, that what's responsible. The roast and coffee is still there, but here it's joined by very real and fleshy coconut, not tasting toasted at all. If Mars made an Espresso Bounty, and I'm not saying they don't, this is what it would taste like. As such, I really liked it. It's more fun than the previous one; more of a frolicsome candy bar than a serious beer, while still definitely a stout for grown-ups. The finish is maybe a little quick for something at 6.5% ABV, though there's some nice complexity before it vanishes off the palate; wisps of raspberry and rosewater. It's nearly brilliant, but I'll settle for very good.

I still prefer Crooked Stave's work in the wild beer sphere, although this lot shows that there's an attention to nuance and detail at work in the brewery that serves them well across the spectrum of genres. This is one of those breweries which seldom puts a foot wrong.