Category: IPA

I Had A “Cold IPA“ And…

Last week I made fun of Beer Cruncher seemingly being the only one out there trying to make “Cold IPAs” happen. Then I ran across my first one in the wild.

A colab between Central California’s Alvarado Street and Figueroa Mountain Brewing called “Acapulco Cold”.

It is actually pretty good. I enjoyed it.

If I am to use this one example of the style, I do think there is a slight difference between this beer and an India Pale Lager style beer. Small, but there. The Lager side is very hidden, but still present.

Good if I don’t want the Lager feel, bad if I do.

Is it enough of a difference to give it its own style name like Cold IPA? Well, if I didn’t care about the marketing side I would say this is a sub-genre of IPL – definitely in the IPL family but enough of a difference to acknowledge it.

You can’t blame them for trying to attach it to the Ale side instead of the Lager side, but they are cheating a bit.

Hey, this particular CIPA is a nice beer. If they want to keep trying to make this style work, go for it – I definitely recommend trying one out if you see one, especially if you’re into a hoppy Lager. Honestly, I would have rather had this beer with Ale yeast though. ??

Too Stupid To Judge Galaxy Beers Then

Machine Learning HDIPA from Bottle Logic Brewing

Beer Twitter regularly bashes Untappd for everything, especially the people that don’t like the style of a beer and rate it poorly.

While I agree if you REALLY don’t understand the style you are drinking you should refrain from rating it and just leave some comments to your future self like “Don’t drink this again, ya dummy!”

BUT. Untappd is whatever you (and I will die on this virtual hill), whatever you want to use it for. If I want to rate beers on how it actually tastes to me and not what a Cicerone trained geek thinks of it, then I will. I paid zero cents for the app just like you, I’ll do what I want and that doesn’t make me better or worse than Beer Geek Twitter.

While we are here, where does this want for Untappd ratings to be 100% accurate end?

The beer pictured at the top, Bottle Logic “Machine Learning” was a total label-buy. Love the label. Love IPAs and usually Hazzies. The beer? Not really. I won’t get it again.

This is my rating:

Basically if I rate something under a 3.75, I was not into it. Nobody is going to grill me for the mediocre rating. But maybe I don’t know what the hell a HDIPA featuring Galaxy, Idaho 7 & El Dorado is supposed to taste like.

Should I have NOT rated it? Of course not. So leave Untappd ratings alone, yo. Make it how you want. ✌️?

Anatomy Of A Hangover: Liquid Gravity’s Mo’ Diggity & East Brother’s Gold, Edition

East Brother Brewing Gold IPA and Liquid Gravity Mo Diggity DDH IPA

I write these hangover posts to help future me and maybe future you, have less hangovers and stuff.

I had three beers last night and woke up with a Level 2 (scale of 1 to 5, five being bad) hangover.

Beer One: East Brother Brewing: Gold IPA. 7.3%. Hops unknown. 16oz can.

Beer Two: Liquid Gravity Brewing: Mo Diggity DDH WCIPA. 7%. All Mosaic Hop. 16oz can.

Beer Three: East Brother Brewing : Gold IPA (same as beer one).

Drinking session: 8PM to Midnight.

Setup: Foot long tuna Subway sandwich at 6:00 PM (slightly embarrassing – work dinner). No food afterwards.

Water: 16oz of water during drinking session.

Normally I drink two 16oz beers a session with an occasional 12oz or 16oz beer. And I usually don’t have more than a Level 1 hangover (aware I had beers the previous night but no headache or sluggishness).

Verdict: I think the combo of only one glass of water, not a lot of food for a base and a slight uptick in alcohol consumed all contributed to this morning’s headache heavy hangover.

Lesson: Hydrate, dumbass.