Have you ever run into someone you haven’t seen since you were in primary school? The shock at how much they’ve changed is perhaps only matched by the surprise at how familiar they are.
Memory is a funny thing. I sometimes forget how much flavours and beer styles and trends evolve. I forget that my expectations change. I forget that what’s normal now wasn’t always the norm, and flavours that used to be familiar to me haven’t crossed my palate in quite some time.
Modern TDH IPA, the latest entry in Ballistic’s Sleep When You’re Dead series, features a blend of hop varieties that are popular now and hop varieties that were popular in the early 2010s. It re-introduces some of that West Coast IPA flavour profile that was so familiar eight years ago… and then uses the technique du jour of dry-hopping it to the moon.
The old school varieties Magnum and Chinook (remember when Chinook was in every IPA you ever drank?) bring a deep, savoury resin to this IPA; a spicy, piney dankness; a hint of that rich motor oil smell you might get from walking past a mechanic’s garage. But this is caught up in a breeze of grapefruit, candied pineapple, and pawpaw from cool kids Citra, Mosaic and Vic Secret. Sweeter on the nose and drier in the mouth, this complex triple-dry-hopped barrage of flavour is surprisingly light-bodied and goes down much more easily that you’d expect for a beer of this heft. But a steadily cumulating bitterness helps to put the brakes on a little, keeping you from foolishly throwing back four of these in rapid succession.
Mick Wust
Published February 17, 2020 2020-02-17 00:00:00
