Little Creatures Big Dipper

It reminds you of the scale of the Little Creatures audience compared to most craft brewers in Australia when you see them describe the 7.8% strength of this beer as "massive alcohol percentage" on their website. Already, hardened beer lovers are popping up claiming it's not big enough to warrant the double IPA epithet, yet to the vast majority of Little Creatures drinkers, this will be a massively boozy concoction. Perspective, people. Anyway, we digress slightly. What of the beer itself, the second biggie in a row in the Single Batch range following the sadly foreshortened Dreadnought. Well, you can tell they've chucked a load of hops at it - and that they've gone for plenty of big aromatic varieities from the States and closer to home too: bags and bags of grapefruit-led aromas and plenty of resinous hop character in the mouth too with the malt, as much as anything, there to keep things in check and let the hops do their thang. Medium-bodied rather than the chewing-on-a-Highland-Toffee-bar experience of some IIPAs, the bitterness builds and lingers but, again, is held in check, with the slightest warmth and tingle on the lips to remind you it is nudging 8%.

Published October 21, 2011 2011-10-21 00:00:00