The Crisp: 2.0 – What a bitter over hopped mess. Expectations were not high when this came as part of a 4 pack where the rest were IPA’s but there was hope that some solace and sanity would prevail in the pilsner, no hope could be found though. Just another bitter hoppy beer wearing a disguise.
Price Average: $20 for 15-pack sampler
Website: https://sixpoint.com/
Pride and Parquet: 5.0 – On the one hand, we’re pleased to try another Lager given how shafted it’s been over here with so many ales as of the last few years. It being from good ol’ Jack’s Abby is a welcome sight, but then they gotta throw some basketball stuff at us and who needs that? Answer Boston people which this is clearly catering too, but how is it for everyone else in the world? Well it’s good they put hoppy there so you’re not surprised. It’s not amazingly tasty or flavorful, but we guess if you were in a pub watching the game – it doesn’t have to be.
Price Average: $11 for 4-pack 16oz
Website: https://jacksabby.com/
Maduro Brown Ale: 6.0 – Fairly dark for a brown ale, both in color and feeling slightly closer to a porter or stout. There’s more cocoa and sweet malt vibes than nuttiness, but that doesn’t stop it from being pretty tasty. Overall may not fit you’re (og recipe) Smutty Old Brown Dog wishes, but it’s a good brown ale as we start now to finally move into autumn and away from all the pales.
Price Average: $10 for 6-pack
Website: https://www.cigarcitybrewing.com/
Big League IPA: 6.5 – There’s that ‘haze’ or ‘hazy’ tag again, and it might be there is a way aside from Cream IPA’s to make a an IPA style that isn’t bad. The beer her is juicy, got some hops but there’s other spice there too and most importantly it isn’t a bitter mess of nonsense. The only real downside is how short the taste actually is, in a blink and you miss it sort of manner.
Price Average: $16.50 for mixed 12 pack cans
Website: https://www.harpoonbrewery.com/
Camp Wannamango Pale Ale: 3.5 – This tastes like mango if it was mixed with cereal. If that sounds sort of odd, not really great – well that’s because it is. It’s not an overall bad pale ale, but there’s really a missing component here of some bitterness or maybe a bit of lemon to add a nice sharpness to the flavor instead of having it seem sort of – soggy.
Price Average: $16.50 for mixed 12 pack cans
Website:https://www.harpoonbrewery.com/
Harpoon IPA: 4.0 – Ahh to be trapped once again in the IPAs of a sampler pack. This starts off a bit nice, slightly closer to an irish red ale (which boy it’s been a while since we’ve seen one of those). The lingering aftertaste is quite nice, but like a shit sandwich, while the initial and lingering tastes is nice – there is still that overly hopped and very bitter middle which seals the deal for being just another boring and disgusting IPA.
Price Average: $16.50 for mixed 12 pack cans
Website: https://www.harpoonbrewery.com/
312 Urban Wheat Ale: 4.0 – Don’t worry this is the final Goose Island, and this time it’s finally not an IPA. The lemon here is light, but welcome. Overall it’s basically a nothing beer. You taste a basic wheaty ale for like a second and then nothing. Now we bought this ‘5 beer’ sampler pack because it came with a shandy, but color us surprised that our favorite is an IPA (they did have 3 tries at it though)
Price Average: $11 for 6 Pack 12oz
Website: https://www.gooseisland.com
Next Coast IPA: 5.0 – We know, 3 IPAs in as many weeks – have we gone mad? Or did we just end up purchasing a sampler pack not realizing how many IPAs were in it (Vote now on your phones!). So we truly enjoyed the Hazy IPA, but were less pleased with the regular fare – how does this one match up? Well smack dab in the middle of the two. Now this is meant to be a bit more juicy and tropical, and it is. However it still has that bitterness from the normal IPA so the result is something that apparently require cinnamon to become better.
Price Average: $12 for 6 Pack 12oz cans
Website: https://www.gooseisland.com
Goose Island IPA: 2.0 – Given how pleasing the Hazy IPA was last week, it seemed right to check out the OG. Unfortunately while that was delicious, fruity, and flavorful (albeit mostly cinnamon) the result here is more true to form. It’s not super hoppy, but damn does it have a lot of bitterness. The sad thing is even as a shandy the bitterness shines through here and there’s not enough hops to balance out either.
Price Average: $6 for 4 Pack 16oz cans
Website: https://www.gooseisland.com
Lost Palate: 7.5 – We typically shy from IPA reviews because of pure saturation, and because we mostly don’t like them (except as a shandy!) There are of course exceptions to the rule, and that’s what you get here. This Lost Palate really wears the mango and cinnamon on it’s sleeve, not in a ‘oh I detect notes of cardamon’ nonsense – this really has got cinnamon going on. The result with that mango is that there really isn’t any bitterness at all. If there’s an issue it’s that the mango goes away rather quickly, making it very easy to down a lot of this and there’s not much aside from the two hit combo – but if this is what ‘hazy’ means we should all get hazy.
Price Average: $3
Website: https://www.gooseisland.com