Day 2 of the Advent-ure Calendar
Day 2: Saranac West End Winter IPA
Now this is exciting: a Winter IPA! From Saranac’s website: “West End Winter IPA is hop-forward with citrusy, resinous hop flavor balanced with enough toasty and caramel malt backbone to warm even the coldest winter night.” Christmas beers are usually not hoppy so this should be very interesting beer to add to the mix. Side Note: we bought these glasses from the same place we bought the beer, Ithaca Coffee Company. If you’re ever in Ithaca, you must stop here. The coffee and beer selection is amazing and the tavern always has a great selection on draft.
REFLECTIONS
Beard & Broad
Beard: Day 2 and already an atypical winter beer. Another Christmas miracle! The color had me weary, and aroma isn’t so much hoppy as it is malty and carmel-y, but it was surprisingly balanced. This is just about as malty as I can take my IPA’s. Intially malty sweet rounded out by a crisp bitter finish; if this were merely an IPA it’d be subpar, but as a winter beer I’m a fan.
Broad: Definitely not as hoppy as I thought it would be. It’s almost too malty for my liking. I don’t get a lot of citrus or other flavors from it. It tastes like a light IPA. Not much going on, but still good. Also, it doesn’t taste like a holiday beer to be.
Adam & Alex
Adam: I don’t generally love IPAs because they tend to be piney which reminds me of gin which I dislike. However I was hoping for a crazy hop loaded beer so I could make a fresh balsam joke because ironically that’s my favorite holiday scent. Alas, no luck. It’s pretty citrusy which I enjoy but doesn’t remind me of anything Christmas. It’s the rare IPA that I could probably drink a bunch of.
Alex:I don’t love IPA’s, but overall I enjoyed this beer. It’s not super hoppy, which for me makes it a lot easier to drink. I do taste the citrusy flavor though I don’t find it to be as strong as Adam did. This doesn’t feel like a winter or a Christmas beer to me either, but it was enjoyable!
Mez & Sam
Mez: As arguably the biggest fan of IPAs of our group, I think the expectation was that I would be this beer’s biggest fan. That would be false. This is an IPA that doesn’t want to be an IPA. The hops are mild at best, I only caught a light citrus note and an unbalanced flavor. It’s an IPA that’s afraid to be an IPA and that is unfortunate. As others have said, doesn’t feel like a holiday/winter beer to me, just in name only.
Sam: Not the grossest IPA ive ever had, but I’m not an IPA fan. There is nothing about this beer that is holiday-ish to me.