Hop Bomb Challenge (2011)
Mikkeller ApS

 

 

 

 

Appearance - Pours a honey colour with two fingers of foamy white head.

Smell - Bitter piney hops, pine resin, caramalts, tropical fruits.

Taste - Hit with the bitter piney hops upfront, along with the caramalts and tropical fruits. Nice bitter finish from pine resin.

Mouthfeel - Medium bodied with nice light tingly bubbles.

Overall - A nicely hopped APA by Mikkeller. I like the concept of having a homebrewer collaboration with Mikkeller. Nice hop bomb for the hop heads out there. Very enjoyable and worth seeking.

Amber Color, poured one finger head that vanished quickly.
Nice hoppy fruity aroma, highlighting a sweet passion fruit. Good carbonation with small bubbles.
Taste follows the aroma, zesty and hoppy flavor that leaves a long bitter flavor. Not extremely hoppy (considering brewers are flying higher and higher), good IPA standard.

 

Bottle from wordemupg, 500ml into a tulip.

Darker orange with a cream colored head. Dense bubbles and a nice wall of lacing. Strong citrus, grapefruit and orange, resin and a bready malt character in the nose. Even a touch of tropical fruit. More bitter citrus rind, grapefruit, pine and herbal hopping with a good bready and lightly sweet malt base. Slightly bigger than medium feel, bitter finish holds for some time. Low carbonation is nice. A good hoppy IPA, nice to try.

 

500ml bottle poured into tulip 14/9/12

A hazy dark amber and it looks thick, thin cap of cream colored head quickly falls too a paper thin film leaving a few dot of lace

S big nose of tropical fruit, pineapple, guava and grapefruit all candied and smothered with brown sugars and caramels, almost stereotypical but it works well for me

T toned down just a little with some more caramels and some pine, although there's more going on I prefer the nose

m slick and oily with enough carbonation to please, rind on the finish with a nice little snap too it

O solid beer that I would consider an industry standard for a good IPA, worth trying for sure

I sat here typing a review for a half hour only too lose it to the computer gods, very annoying. of course I had an empty glass as I tried to remember everything I had just finished typing. I remember that I liked it though and you might too

 

500ml bottle, 6.3% ABV. The 2011 Hop Bomb Challenge winner, Søren Davids', collaboration with Mikkeller. Brewed with Simcoe, Centennial, and Athanum hops.

This beer pours a glassy, dark golden amber colour, with two fingers of dense foamy beige head, which settles at an even, steady pace, leaving some nice limestone rock face lace around the glass.

It smells of sweet grapefruit flesh, pine needles, doughy caramel malt, some orange cream, and further floral, perfumed hops. The taste is bitter grapefruit and orange citrus rind, sharp pine resin, a bit of unsweetened generic orchard fruit, a rather weak dry biscuity caramel malt 'backbone', and some, um, hoppy alcohol.

The bubbles are average in their understated role, the body just on the south side of medium weight, and generally quite smooth, for all those prickly hops lurking about. It finishes bitter, in an approaching the bitterness horizon sort of way - the various inputs kind of coalescing into a oneness of bitter, which just happens to crush any lingering vestiges of malt sweetness, if they were ever really there at all.

I can see why this won the challenge - it is indeed a hop bomb, though still within conventional means - they haven't quite gone nuclear yet. This means an acceptable drinkiness quotient (don't bother looking that up), for such a skewed by design offering - get yo hop fix here, eh?

 

The beer is clouded murky orange/brown, has a low yellow off-white head, no lacing, but good curtains.

The smell is floral, honey, resin, pine needles.

The taste starts with toffee and slightly of creme brûle, lemon curd, elderberry juice, bitter oranges and tropical sweet fruits.

A small carbonation, a coarse and oily (!) feeling, a very dry finish.

An enormous and exciting amount of hops, a rather good composition, however maybe a bit too much to be really useful.

This beer is a collaboration between Søren Davids and Mikkeller. It is brewed at Amager Bryghus.

Thanks to bu11zeye for sharing this bottle. The beer pours a hazy golden orange color with a white head. The aroma is full of hops. I get a ton of sweet pineapple as well as some hoppy pine and resin notes and some bread from the malt. The flavor is more of the same. I get low to medium bitterness from the hops and a lot of pineapple and other tropical fruit notes. The bready malt keeps the bitterness from being overpowering. Medium mouthfeel and medium carbonation. A nice American Pale Ale.