“A southern hemisphere take on a new world IPA. Hop forward, with tropical fruit notes and a touch of spice.”
Glassware: IPA
Appearance: Kinda burnished orange with an amber hue. It forms a short white head which gradually peels off and leaves a reasonable lace as we go.
Aroma: Uniquely antipodean with its sharp lime, gooseberry and lush evergreen kicked on by ripe stonefruit i.e peach, melon and resinous/sappy pine. It has a real strong scent of white wine (namely young Riesling) to it which is a trait of Nelson Sauvin but funnily enough it isn’t in the hop bill. But then again Waimea is.
Flavour: Follows through nicely. Truck loads of lime and gooseberry, vines, stonefruit, pine resin, young white wine and fruity herbals like lemongrass and lemon thyme. Very subtle and slightly dry malt at its core. Mildly bitter, grassy/herbal finish with lingering green citrus.
Mouthfeel: Crisp, mineraly, moderately bodied. Co2 is a little flatter than we’d like but the 6.6% ABV is well concealed.
Overall: In this age of the never ending haze craze it takes some gall to put out a different and localised IPA like this. The best thing is they pulled it off. Big ups.