Dubhe
Uinta Brewing Company

 

 

12oz can

Darkish chesnut. Smells like cocoa and dried leaves... also kinda smells like dog food haha, wish i was kidding. Taste goes majorly flat, it's like a poor cocoa-y porter and a very average piney IPA mixed together. Abrasive alcohol flavor and feel also

This should be right up my alley, instead i had to choke it down

Appearance:
Deep, chestnut brown. A head of milky, light brown that’s super frothy, with great retention. Oddly, doesn’t lace. That mass of froth just slides about when you tilt the glass, like an ice cube floating in water.

Bouquet:
Deeply roasted malts and thick, smokey coffee. Ends with an unexpectedly alluring tango between toasted vanilla beans and piney hops.

Feel:
Luscious, full body with a low-volume twirl of supple carbonation. Bittersweet.

Taste:
Starts with a slow breeze of silky caramel... then the wind picks up. Brown malts, heavily laden with cocoa powder stand immutable amidst a tornado of bold, earthy hops. After the hop storm passes, a warming chocolate liqueur slowly lances the cloud cover like beams of sunlight.

 

 

 

No light coming through the black body. Decent size tan head and good lacing add up to a very attractive appearance. Toasted malt aroma with herbal, spicy hop accents. Hops gain more traction in the taste while the malts, along with some dark fruit, add an earthy balance. Noticed a little bittersweet chocolate in the aftertaste. Nicely carbonated, medium-to-full bodied mouthfeel.

 

 

A-dark cola brown, with a modest (-) creamy foam head. Looks like a porter.
S-dark malts, chocolate and piney hops
T-This is outstanding. A DIPA with roasty malts and prodigious hop backbone. Not the citrusy hops so common in every IPA these days. Above average bitter, minimal sweet.
M-Medium (+) body, below average carbonation. More like tingle on the palate. Finish is semi-dry, true to the style.
O-One of the better beers I've had in a long time. Underrated and underappreciated, as is the Cascadian Dark Ale style.

 

 

Like the artwork on the can, i prefer this brew well after sun down when every star in the sky is twinkling.

In a tulip with outside of glass frozen, I like the way the chill eased me in to the complex flavors.

Tastes of molasses, crusty browned steak, roasted cacao beans and espresso. balanced by an acidic, almost ripe apricot.

Really good. pairs well with blue cheese!

 

 

Pours a beige foam head with good lacing. A sweet roasted malt and vanilla flavor meets the tongue with a pine finish. Full-bodied hoppiness and pleasing ABV.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I think I say this every time I have an American Black Ale but PEOPLE DON'T BREW ENOUGH OF THESE!

Shiny black with a tall and firm tan covering.

Flowing roasted malts are followed by lesser notes of black grape, plum and caramel.

Has an enjoyable and complex mix of roasted malt, dark fruit, pine, dark chocolate, gum and lasting caramel on the tongue.

Medium bodied and quite smooth with only a hint of alchol heat.

A fabulous take on this undervalued style.

 

 

Tried this first a few years ago at a tap take over in a Flying Saucer (the name of the tap room) in Texas. The regional manager for Uinta was there to explain all of the featured beers, and some behind the brew tank info. For instance, this brew is pronounced Doobie. It's name is combination of Dub, for Double IPA, and HE for Hemp, as it is brewed with some real hemp seed. They named it Dubhe as a subtle reference to the Cannabis Sativa (Hemp) seed that is used in this brew.

Now that you know what to call it, I can tell you that it is one of my absolute favorite Imperial, or DIPAs, and I only wish it were available year round. It's a true Black IPA, so it looks like a stout in a glass, but it tastes like a solid double/Imperial IPA. It has a good body, but it doesn't have the thick body of a stout, which is nice. Not made with any of the current grapefruit centric hops, which I personally wish everybody would stop using, so it has a more classic hop bite, slightly bitter, but not excessively so. At 9.3% ABV you might expect it to e somewhat syrupy, but it is not, and it has a very dry mouth feel, not sweet at all.

This is a truly unique DIPA in my opinion, and I honestly can't compare it to any other DIPA or Imperial IPA that I have tried, and I've tried a bunch of them. Get it if you can find it, you will probably like it.

[Original rating 2012-07-13] Pours deep dark brown with a bit of red in the light. Aroma is hops, malt, some pine. Taste is bitter at first with a sweeter boozy finish.

 

 

L: Fresh can poured black with a thick and dense dark tan cocoa head.
S: Aroma from the can is hops, not of the citrus kind, but you know it’s hoppy, and good. But when you pour it, you really smell the malt and deep robust chocolate coffee vanilla malt and I never smell the hoppy aroma again. But the aroma is nice and strong.
T: Very flavorful! Unique! Bold and balanced but complex. I’m having a hard time describing it because I’ve never had anything like it. I would say it leans on the side of malt dark vanilla chocolate with the hoppy bitterness keeping it real.
F: Perfect! Thick rich robust and full with a nice bite.
O: I must admit that the first one I tried didn’t meet my expectations but I have grown to love it since the second session. Let it warm up. On the third session I drank 2 back to back and I’m very pleased. It’s bold, different, strong and full of flavor. Imperial Black IPA brewed with hemp seeds! It is what it is! 11.49 for a sixer at Chelsea Food Mart! First offering from Uinta is a winner.

 

The pour is beautiful - tons of head and a solidly black beer. I actually get a bit more of the chocolate malt on the nose than the hops, which is odd since the IBUs are over 100 on this. No matter, the hops come through just fine on the taste. Despite this, the bitterness of the hops is tempered quite well by the chocolate malt flavor, and there's some vanilla in there to give it just a bit of a sweetness. They are perfect complements to each other in this beer. Even though nothing is overpowering, it's still fairly intense - it's just not as much of a palette wrecker as you might expect it to be. The balance on this is admirable. This is a style that I assume is quite difficult to pull off, but damn Uinta really nailed it here.

Very dark brown color with tan cap and some lacing.

Aroma is primarily roast coffee with some vanilla highlights.

Flavor is dark roasted malt with more than usual accompanying roast malt bitterness. That's mostly what I get but it's not a one trick pony, rather it's two trick because the roast and bitterness are about equal. Brewer says the flavor notes are coffee, vanilla and bright pine. I certainly get the coffee, vanilla is more a feel than a taste and apparently there's a dark roast cloud covering the pine forest.

Medium full body with balancing carbonation.

Overall it's a pretty simple coffee sort of brew that carries bitterness to a new level. At 100 IBU I was really expecting a higher than usual hop bitterness but hop flavors are completely covered up here by the dark roast tones.

Poured from 12oz bottle into glass. Best by date on label is '10/27/16J'. This beer has just been hanging out in the frig, and my best intentions to drink it have been put off until now.
Body is cola color brown and clear. Lots of bubbles streaming up to support the light tan head settling into creamy cap. Good coverage of lacing around glass.
Aroma is sweet, with dark roasted malts, cocoa, coffee and dark fruit.
Taste is sweet/tangy balance, with lots of chocolate/vanilla, coffee and dark fruit. Some hop spice at the back end. Dank as the beer trails off.
Medium, supporting mouth feel, with good carbonation.
Such a good black IPA. Almost drinks like a hoppy stout, with the strong chocolate/vanilla component. Rarely found, but always on the radar.

 

 

 

 

Poured from a 12 oz bottle into a tulip

L: Nearly black pour. 3 fingers of foamy off-white head leave great lacing.

S: Roast malts and piney hops.

T/F: Follows the nose. Good roasted grains/bitterness... the hops are bitter tending towards pine and resin. Mild sweetness comes through mid sip. Notes of coffee and chocolate paying homage to a stout. Medium to light in body... well carbonated.

O: A solid black IPA. The bitterness of the roast complements the hops without overpowering. Good mix of syles... one of the better black IPA's I've come across.