StereoHopic Vol. 4
Lagunitas Brewing Company

 

 

Taster at Shade City Brewfest. Golden pour, small foamy head. Aroma and taste were tropical fruit and tons of floral notes. Just a bit too flowery for me.

 

lotus and sabro in this edition, i know the hops keep changing but the beers are getting a little samey to me, this isnt as dry hoppy as it needs to be for these varietals to pop, and the whole thing feels strong and strdy for no reason, and at the expense of the hops, although there are still some real nice notes in this. deep golden like the others, close to clear, an inch of rising white head. lightly metallic in the nose, pale but still somehow overly grainy to me, and with the sabro way in front of the lotus hops, familiar then, relatively fresh, and with hints of melon, green apple, ripe papaya, and a bit of sometimes characteristic green onion from it, light coconut flesh too, and the same is true of the flavor. the lotus comes behind it with light orange zest, lemon curd, and herbal character, sweet honey and cut flowers, great with the lightly toasted grain actually, more cohesive than in earlier beers in this series. bitter too though which i like, this one more like ipa, less like pale, on the dry side, well fizzy, and very modern, even if the proportions arent exactly right. these hops go awesome together.

 

 

 

 

Golden yellow with a 1" white head, which lasts. Moderate lacing.

Aroma is floral, orange, grass.

Taste is orange zest, earthy, grass.

Medium body, lively carbonation. Dry finish.

An IPA that didn't appeal to me? Oh, the horror!

 

 

12oz bottle, served in a tulip glass. Date stamp on neck: 047 2 2 5615 1848. No idea what that means, but let's hope it's fresh.

Appearance: Golden yellow with a bit of haze. Thin white head with persistent islands and small strands of lacing.

Smell: Definite orange, tropical fruit, a wee bit of pineapple, and maybe a hint of coconut. Definitely tropical.

Taste: Nicely tart orange flavor mixed in with some other tropical fruits and a bit of grapefruit as well. A little bit of woody/cedar note to my taste buds at the finish along with the citrus. Hops dominate the flavor of this beer, but there is some good bready/lightly sweet malt for balance underneath all those hops.

Mouthfeel: Good carbonation that scrubs the palate clean, but quite sticky on the teeth. Good thickness as well.

Overall / Drinkability: Very tasty - I like the tartness of the citrus profile with this beer. Interesting to drink the whole way down and I would not mind a second one, or even a 16oz can of this. Well done.

 

 

Lagunitas Brewing Co. "StereoHopic Vol. 4"
12 fl. oz. brown glass bottle coded "047 2 2 5615 1825" and sampled on 2 July 2022
$2 @ ACME #2762, Philadelphia, PA

Notes via stream of consciousness: The label lists Lotus and Sabro hops. I'm familiar with Sabro (tangerine, coconut, cedar) but not Lotus so I'm curious. It's poured a clear deep gold body beneath a short head of white foam. The aroma is citrusy/tropical (mainly orange) with what seems like sweet red berries and mint. On to the taste... the malt is straightforward and sweetish with a grainy and bready character. The hops remain very much as they're found in the aroma with the tangerine/orange forward but backed by the red berries and the mint. What else is there? I get apple but that's common; I find apple in almost every beer. Is there some vanilla? Or is that the coconut suggesting it? I'm not really getting coconut so it must be vanilla. Weird, but cool. Also weird is that I'm not getting the cedar that I usually find with Sabro. There's some there, and it helps to dry it in the finish, but it's not nearly as strong as I usually find it which is a good thing. A lot of brewers tend to use too much Sabro and it becomes a bit much. A firm bitterness balances it and it finishes with a swirl of sharp tangerine and berries that fades to let the cedar and mint come forward in the mingering, dry finish. I'm really surprised by this. It's got a great, delicate fruitiness that's clear and focused atop the malt and then balanced by the woodier notes. Great! in the mouth it's medium bodied and gently crisp with a fine-bubbled, moderate carbonation that leaves it smooth. The head has held up well, but not as well as the last SteroHopic IPA that I tried (Vol. 3) and they seem like totally different base beers. Maybe that's because that one was older and somewhat oxidized. Who the hell knows how old they are though with the F'd up coding system they're using. Craft beer used to be about letting you know how old the beer was and now all I get is "047 2 2 5615 1825". I'm guessing that the first 5 digits are Julian but I'm not sure. Anyway, it still left great lacing about the glass so even with a little less foam on top it was still pretty good. I loved this beer! I usually don't drink the entire thing while I'm writing it up but I'm almost there. It's just very nicely balanced and rounded with a brilliant combination of flavor notes.
Review #8,105

I bought a 6pck of bottles of this beer from my local Kroger store. It poured a clear golden with white head that is leaving some lace. The scent had dank white grape notes. The taste was nicely balanced and easy to drink with mellow fruit flavor like peach, apricot, and ripe semi sweet berry. The mouthfeel was medium in body and had good carbonation. Overall it is a great beer.

On tap at Swillburger/The Playhouse in Rochester, NY.

This one pours a dark-ish orange color, with a small head, and lots of lacing.

This smells almost overripe, with some astringency and metallic flavors.

Lagunitas is usually a very solid brewery, so it's kind of mystifying why this is honestly pretty terrible. There's an overripe syrupy sweetness, too much astringent and stale bitterness, almost a vegetal character, and a lot of maltiness. This is mystifying, it's just a bad IPA from a brewery that pretty much mostly does good IPAs.

This is really not drinkable, with an unpleasant metallic biterness dominating the finish.

I'm not sure what wrong here, but this is just not good.