Tag Archives: hops

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3 Floyd’s Arctic Panzer Wolf, Imperial IPA, 9% abv

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Arctic Panzer, OH OLD LABEL STATUS.

Arctic Panzer Wolf, Three Floyds, imperial IPA 9% abv

A: Very transparent thin yellow almost lager color, good carbonation and lots of sticky lacing. Middle carbonation throughout. There’s no cool way to say this, but, it is a very…pretty…beer…like it looks hella tight with the golden hue and sick bubbles, yeah.

S: holy citrus bomb, you get a huge bouquet of pineapple, apricot, and a bit of a melon smell from the hops. Remiscient of a brighter pliny with more citrus and no herbal aspects

T: Strangely the huge citrus notes arent as present on the palate but that doesn’t mean that this is a flawed beer, just got the old hopes up a bit too high with the amazing smell. It has a fast clean finish with no linger hop dryness, just a sweet juicy hop profile that is incredibly smoothe. If this is an imperial IPA, you would never know it. No alcoholic heat and it drinks like a single IPA.

M: Great frothiness, nice middle ground of coating and bubbly crispness. It has this “just out of the shower IPA” sort of feel to it that is hard to find in beers this big. It is a good thing that this isn’t readily available on the west coast because I could see beach disasters with a beer this refreshing maintaining its stealthy abv.

D: This is gonna get a solid 5/5 on this aspect. The drinakbility is scary, a bomber of this evaporates incredibly quickly. I would be interested to try this on tap to see if it is consistently this drinkable. Notwithstanding, one bomber will not be enough, 2 may be too few as well. Go to Indiana and stock up I guess because you will burn through quantities of this beer incredibly quickly.

Narrative: The hop strain was too powerful and OPEC knew it. Their days of limitless control were over once the hop oil shieks took control. “And the rancid odor SHALL FILL THE STREETS OF THE PACIFIC NORTH WEST!” the new dictators boomed emphatically from their Oregon and Canadian mounts. After the hop profiles were discovered, nothing else was left aside from destitute desert life. At least, no one had to live in Indiana any more. The masses sigh a huge breath of relief and brows were wiped universally. “AND TODAY, THIS CAR MAY RUN ON HOP OIL, BUT NOT A SINGLE DROP OF BLOOD WAS SPILLED LIVING IN THE TURBULENT MIDWEST.” The crowd cheered triumphantly, knowing what a huge obstacle they had overcome.

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Three Floyd’s Gumball Head, Belgian Pale Ale, The Midwest Starts Big Leaguing

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Getting some GumballHead, get get getting some-

3 floyds Gumball head Belgian Pale Ale, Indiana Starts Socking Fools.

A: super thin lager clarity, bright yellow gold, nice foamy carbonation, no lacing. It isn’t anything to write home about, but neither was that ornate horse that toppled the walls so lovingly crafted by Poseidon. Both involve epic things.

S: It smells of pine and orange, some lemon zest, but not in a huge hoppy DIPA/IPA way, more understated. It feels like someone who knows a good deal about hops but references then so expertly that the underlying experience is presented clearly.

T: very mellow citrus notes, quick hop finish, super refreshing, very well done. There is a light hoppy presence that is almost a garnish to the sweet refreshing notes at the outside of the taste. The final amazing closer is the cucumber crispness finish, this beer just screams summertime. Which is strange because I usually imagine summertime in Indiana as being muggy, boring, and not delicious. Paradoxes abound.

M: Just fantastic, especially for a cross-over style. They seemed to take a big risk by compromising the smallest elements, resulting in a huge payoff. In reality, they need to only sell these in growlers because that is the reasonably demanded service size of this refreshing beer.

D: This makes me hate the Midwest even further. It is strictly unfair that a place without a beach, without any coastal weather would make something with this level of refreshment. I don’t sit around reading Sherpa books, I don’t go rotating city crops in urban los angeles, because I KNOW MY PLACE. It just is not fair that Indiana makes a beer like this and then withholds it from the west coast. It is akin to the aesthetics of Mormons. Patent base denial.

Narrative: Parents were a little skeptical of Gumbalicitus, a shiny new fangled prescription drug for unruly Midwestern children. Settlers used to call it wind sickness, but they soon learned that it was an irascible desire to leave locations of concentrated boredom. That is, until this new drug arrived, served in 12oz doses, the highly enjoyable cocktail drug apparently makes even the flattest, most agricultural areas completely tolerable. Iowa parents noted that their students even volunteered to stay in-state upon being prescribed this barbituate calming drug. Side-effects include narcolepsy, contentment, desires to attend comicons, Xbox live subscriptions, and consumption of Hot Pockets. Gumbalicitus is only to be provided to those in need. Anyone living within 90 miles of the Pacific Ocean should not take this drug as it may result in an endorphine overload, burning out the neural cortex. SHIPPING IS STRICTLY DISALLOWED TO CALIFORNIA.

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Victory Storm King, 9.1% abv; Crown King Nothing

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The King of Drizzles

King is Loose Term for Storms

Victory Storm King Stout, Imperial Stout 9.1% abv

A: This has a slightly watery deep blackness to it, like the thin ink of a Pentel pen. The carbonation is outrageous. I mean that in the classic sense, inclining one towards outrage. It creates a huge 5” head that just maintains like mocha whipped cream. The lacing looks like a perverse Rorschart painting. It is a very attractive stout, for those so inclined.

 

S: The nose is a bit thin and doesn’t present much beyond a sweetness and a candied malt. I get a bit of a burnt vanilla and….that’s about it. T: There’s a bit of chocolate at the outset that gets very herbal very quickly. This feels far more like the Black DIPAs coming into vogue than the traditional stouts that I have come to grow and love. The taste finishes with a deep piney bitterness that is more like Hopsicle but with chocolate malts. I don’t know how this was classified as an imperial stout, but, variety is the spice of life, so says my Home Ec…er…”Teen Living” teacher.

 

M: Again, this doesn’t coat like a stout, nor does it present a big frothiness. It has a thin mouthfeel with a big hop body to it, if I didn’t know better, I would say that this tastes like a messed up DIPA that has a ton of high alpha acid hops. But, I guess I would welcome innovation over and above the same damn dancer/boxer/football team movie year in and year out. At least I have something to tell my children with this one, a good old epic tale about the old Imperial Stout/IPA that I enjoyed on a weeknight. Ah, memories.

 

D: This isn’t exceptionally drinkable. It is too bitter and doesn’t present all those Preggo delights that I enjoy: where’s my chocolate and deep smoky malts. To be clear, only negligent expecting mothers should drink this, if at all. Wait, ok, to be clear, this is a confusing malty hoppy bomb that belongs in that confusing penumbra category of Black IPA madness. Notwithstanding, it is welcome in my mouth. It’s hard to end on that but, oh well.

 

Narrative: “I need to get my Wiz Khalifa on, aint tryna be coding .DLLs all up in this shit,” Walter Lee protested voraciously from his cubicle. “They always posting on me tryna front on some spaghetti code ass bullshit, acting like I haven’t seen a debugged kernel up in this bitch.” His supervisor shook his head at the recalcitrant associate and tapped his red pen lightly against his clip board. This wasn’t the first computer coding job that Walter had been fired from. Admittedly, it was Neoscript’s own fault for hiring on a latent racist basis assuming that Walter Lee would be a successful coder. “I see dems, they post all up on this cubicle like they OWN ME. I post up on my set, peep this OH WHO JUST SET UP A BEOWOLF CLUSTER? Oh shit, that’s right, Walter. Ha haaaay!” the resonant call not unlike Jadakiss’s patent sound clipped against the aluminum ceilings. This was a clear case of a mismatch. This was someone who was ill-equipped to fight in the market in which he was competing, despite his inherent merit. “watch, watch, someone gonna write about this situation and be STRAIGHT RACIST!” Walter uttered from his Ukranian lips.