Side Cut North East IPA
Bridge Brewing Company

Hazy yellow-straw color. Lots of small bubbles formed on the side of the glass with a lower number of small bubbles rising from the bottom. Didn't form much of a head, despite the excessive foaming out of the bottle when I opened the cap (it was not shaken in the 2 feet from the fridge to the counter where it was opened). Left a small ring of bubbles on the surface next to the glass and a similar small ring of bubbles for lacing.

Mild vegetable hop scent. Swirling the glass kicked up a little barnyard.

Medium bitters with a vegetal hop flavor. Slightly sweet. Mild malts. The aftertaste is bitter with a little bit of the barnyard showing up.

Slightly tongue tingling until it foams up. Medium body with a little astringency at the end.

Fairly average IPA for flavor. Nothing stands out. I didn't pick up the fruit flavors suggested on the label. Perhaps these were wiped out by the mild barnyard that is afflicting everybody in the area.

 

 

 

 

Muddy blonde with legs. 3.75
Oxidized honey plus some tangerine. 3.5
Slight toffee shortbread, then orange hard candy, slight tropical, then a weird earthy finish. 3.5
Almost medium, round, oily. 4

Topaz, Citra, Columbus, Centennial

No brightness, too dark, and some signs of oxidation. New England IPA is a result, kids, not a process. Below average. 3.5

Pours opaque peachy amber with a small off white head. Great lacing throughout.

Lots of stone fruit on the nose from the hops and a nice touch of sweetness from the malts, a really inviting balance.

Lots of stone fruit and citrus with a caramel sweetness from malts, a delicate balance which seems pretty spot on.

Mouth feel is where this brew loses me, definitely rough around the edges. Prickly carbonation and a drying but sticky boozy finish.

 

650ml bottle, subtitled 'North East IPA' - cool, there's not many 'locally' made versions of this sub-style available around here.

This beer pours a very murky, medium apricot amber colour, with four fingers of puffy, rocky, and somewhat bubbly tan head, which leaves some random sudsy island group lace around the glass as it lazily recedes.

It smells of bready and doughy caramel malt, musty orange, lemon, and white grapefruit citrus rind, some chalky flintiness, honeyed generic stone fruit, and more leafy, herbal, and resinous piney green hop bitters. The taste is grainy and bready caramel malt, a lesser biscuity caramel sweetness, muddled domestic citrus pith, a touch of more exotic tropical fruitiness, wet stone paths, and some testy leafy, weedy, and dank pine forest floor verdant hoppiness.

The carbonation is fairly tame in its barely-there frothiness, the body a solid middleweight, and quite smooth, with a nice fruity and airy creaminess present from the onset. It finishes on the sweet side, lots of citrus and exotic fruity essences buoying up the lingering caramel malt, while a few hints of estery alcohol make themselves known.

Overall, this is a pleasantly rendered iteration of the 'Vermont' or 'US Northeast' way of making a differentiated IPA. Lots of big fruit, edgy pine and friends, and yes, with a haziness factor up the yin-yang! Not as much as an eye-opener as when I first tried Heady Topper, but as they say, imitation is indeed the sincerest form of flattery.

 

Side cut by Bridge Brewing Company 7.3% poured from a 650mL into a pint. Picked up because I've tried most of the other stuff at my local BCL, noticed it displayed itself as citrusy so thought id give it a shot.
L: One finger of perfect white head. Very orange, murky. Almost looks like dirty water and not translucent at all. Lacing sticks.
S: The citrus definitely hits. Apple, lemon, very hoppy (earthy, resiny?) undertone.
T: Well the citrus that stands out in the smell hides in the taste. It's more malty and tastes more earthy than citrus, very surprising. The 7.3% is hidden a little but not much
F: Taste sticks in your throat while. Quite smooth.
Ov: Drinkability is high not heavy at all glad I picked this one up. Smell is reminiscent of Four Winds Juxtapose, taste is quite different than Juxtapose.

Poured from a 650ml bottle into my IPA glass. 7.3 ABV, 59 IBU
A: Pours a hazy golden amber with a huge thick white head that lasts with tons of sticky lacing.
S: Citrus and hops stand out wit a hint of pine resin.
T: Minor citrus notes with hops .
F: Lots of carbonation really at the max, clean and crisp with good balance hops/malt.
O: Pretty good IPA lacking on the taste buds somewhat worth a try for sure.

 

 

Look: gloomy autumn face hiding a lush secret behind turgidity and almost snow...

Smell: Uncapped and out rushes a cavalcade of tripping tangerines and loudly orating oranges. In its wake snapped forests ooze resin and pine tears; trampled peaches are absorbed by the honey-muddy earth. An envious lemon tsks caustically the bacchanal wastrel whirlwind from afar. Sometime afterwards a lone apple falls and peels itself in expectation of the Sugar Star's arrival...

Taste: a slow leather tongue licks upward into pine tree bitterness and ice, then tumbles down into a mass of tropical fruits huddled within heaps of bronzed woody cereals and grains. An aery aftertaste coated in honey and primordial stickiness suggests a final breathless drowning...

Feel: smooth: a bolt of rare silk wraps the entirety of my mouth. thick: clouds climbing clouds on top of clouds....

Overall: a beer not to be denied.

This beer is like an updated Fat Tug - same sort of resiny, piny, medium-bodied mouthfeel, really well balanced hop/malt profile, maybe a tad "nicer" in aftertaste (at least compared to cca. 2016 Fat Tug, anyway)

All in all, I'm really glad we got a beer to compete with Fat Tug. Pretty much nothing in BC compared to Fat Tug, despite the abundance of IPAs in the province. Fat Tug kinda stood alone for a long time as one of the only well-balanced, old school IPAs around. Sure, you had Spirit of Dixmas from Brassneck, but it wasn't a year-round offering. Side Cut isn't, either - it's a rotating release, but I'm hoping it'll become enough of a staple that they start brewing it on the regular.

It's easily the best beer Bridge Brewing has ever put out in their short lifespan as a brewery. I hope more beers of this caliber will follow.

Wow! Not very hazy, but all the aroma is certainly there! Hints of dank oxidation, but otherwise plenty of great flavour. It's not heady topper, but I'd take it over a Fat Tug.