Arcadia Hopmouth

From Arcadia Brewing in Battle Creek, Michigan: Hopmouth (8.1%abv)

A very traditional English ale brewery is trying to keep up with the Jones's and who can blame them? They make great beer and I'm sure this is going to be great too. A double IPA released in a 22oz bottle, the first in "The Brew Crew Big Beer Series...a tasty fix for your hop jones." It's kind of a shame actually that they've gone this direction with their image. Hop jones? What kind of traditional English brewer says that? Oh well.

My little fantasy, neatly partitioned enclaves of traditional brewerdom taking over the US, will have to remain a fantasy.

A fairly light colored beer that shines mostly russet red in the light. The head faded extremely quickly as the nice natural blobs of CO2 fled the rather warm beer in a hurry. They left a thin but persistant cap of off white foam covering the beer. But there is a bit of sticky lace clinging to the glass.

The nose is big. Big resinous hop juice wafts off this beer slowly, thickly, punctuated with lemon rind. I want to say East Kent Goldings in the nose. That kind of rustic, earthy character. Definately a hint of ethanol there too. A bit of prickly (?) fermentation character folded softly into malty caramel.

Big, nay huge, resinous, piney hop flavor dominates with a bit of medicinal edge to it, but not much distinction. High, tingly hop bitterness and perhaps fermentation character make this beer a touch prickly. But still enjoyable. The malt character here is quite nice. It's rich and substantial but the beer is fairly dry. This is not to say that the malt makes any headway against the hop torrent, but it's there.

Fairly nice, medium dry finish with a nice lingering hop flavor riding along on more than a whisper of malt sweetness. Just a touch of astringency in the finish.