Reverting to type

"Liquid Hoppiness" is a bit on the nose as a name for a Sierra Nevada beer. That's the thing they've been known for providing since the early 1980s. Nevertheless, here it is: a 7% ABV IPA, claiming to be "juicy" and I wonder before popping the tab if that's simply a trend-chasing word to put on the front of a can containing nothing of the sort.

It is hazy, though lightly so: translucent rather than opaque. It smells hazy too, with a dollop of creamy vanilla coming through first, before satsuma and pineapple. I don't think "juicy" is the word for the flavour. It's sweet all right, but more orangeade-like, with a carbonic sharpness and a pithy bitterness. The vanilla drains away quickly leaving a clean and dry finish.

This is rather tasty. There's nothing fancy going on, and the hop kick isn't as big and bold as some of Sierra Nevada's other IPAs, but there are echoes of both the flagship pale ale and Torpedo in here. They've been given a very slight modernisation though nothing too much. It's bitter at heart and that's how it ought to be.

Odell is another American brewery which made its name with generous hopping back in the heyday of American IPA. Even though classics like their flagship and Myrcenary are still very much around, we also get a lot of... other... stuff from them. Their Sippin' Pretty sour ale, launched a few years ago, has now spawned a rake of brand extensions. I dealt with one of them, Sippin' Tropical, last August, and now here's another, with the inauspicious name of Sippin' Lemonade.

From the branding it appears to be one of those carefree, outdoor, summery fellows that European breweries often create at 4% ABV and below but Americans can't countenance making less than 5%, which is what this is. "Ale brewed with lemons and cane sugar" is the brewery's rather blunt description of it, which does say much about how it's made.

In the glass it's a slightly hazy yellow and the base beer's tartness is immediately apparent in the aroma. Similarly, the flavour starts out puckering and tangy, suggesting rather more souring than most kettle-soured beers get. The cane sugar is asleep on the job, then, but I don't mind. The lemon lands in late and comes with a herbal side which I guess justifies the name: it's lemonade of the classy, cloudy, homemade sort that they're invoking here. Those herbs -- basil and rosemary to me -- occupy the aftertaste and are the best bit. Overall this works well. It's a properly tart sour golden ale while also a summer soft-drink analogue with more complexity than I was expecting. Keeping it simple with lemons yields better sour-beer results than berries or tropical fruits, I reckon. And you can quote me on that.

Finally it's Oskar Blues with Mutant X IPA, seemingly named for some unspecified hop extraction technology. It's a very eggy yellow and 7% ABV. The aroma is fresh and juicy, I'm sure as intended, like mandarin in particular. It's altogether more bitter and even a little savoury on tasting. Touches of fried onion and roast garlic, calming down to lime and grapefruit, before the fruit salad slides in again in the finish. A building weedy resinousness creeps in as it goes along, leaving the tongue coated by the end, in a very west coast way. It's quite the tour of American IPA attributes that Oskar brings us on here. Hard bitterness set on a fluffy New England texture. It's different, but I like it.

None of these three are their respective breweries' best work, but I can't really complain when their excellent core range products were on sale next to them. This is the life I chose and you're under no obligation to follow.

Down from the mountains

A selection of beers from Odell today, none of them brand new releases as far as I know.

Pink Sippin' Pretty is fruited and sour, and for a change is actually sour, though not in an especially complex way. There's a realistic raspberry  and strawberry sweetness. The can says I should expect açaí, guava and elderberry. I guess my tastebuds don't run that exotic. OK, maybe there's a slight tropical buzz in there, but not much. It's only 4.5% ABV and it's not thin and watery, so that's a plus. It's not particularly beery either, however. If you want something lightly tart but mostly alcopoppy, this will do.

I can't believe I haven't had Drumroll before. It's been around for ages but I couldn't find any reference to me drinking it so into the basket it went. It's a pale ale of 5.3% ABV, pale orange with a slight haze. The flavour is a mix of citrus pith and savoury dregs, mostly quite serious and bitter. I even get a hint of smoky phenols. Against this there's a somewhat cloying ice cream sweetness, tasting like vanilla with an element of sticky boiled sweet thrown in too. It's not in any way polished or refined, giving the impression of something dashed off in order to meet a pale ale spec without too much thought. A little more hop bitterness or turning it sweeter with crystal malt would have made it more recognisable, but as-is this is just confusing. Even cleaning the yeast gunk out would help. This is far from Odell's best work.

Mountain Standard I had in its black IPA form a few years back. This is a very very pale IPA of the same name, though the ABV is down to 6.5% from 8.1. There's only a very slight haze rather than full-on murk, and frankly that makes me feel like cheering when I come to American IPA these days. A light lemony spritz forms the aroma while the flavour has some softer, juicier fruit going on: cantaloupe, apricot and lychee. There's a grainy crispness to balance this, but not much by way of bittering. The texture is soft and creamy, with plenty of substance but no alcohol heat. This is a very easy-going beer, quite sessionable tasting despite the strength. No mad complexities, no fancy gimmicks and no off flavours. Just fruity American IPA created in an accessible way.

A Colorado brewery doing its best work in the IPA sphere is hardly news, but here it is anyway.