Altered Beast
Southern Prohibition Brewing

 

Color is light and hazy. Head is gone quickly. Lacing is nonexistent. Citrusy and crispy effervescence. Sweet but in a good way. I'd try it again for sure!

 

Canned on 1/5/20

Pours a glossy, hazed golden sunflower body capped with around a finger of creamy off-white head; retention is mediocre, resulting in spotty chunks of cap, an inconsistent frothy collar, and a thin curtain of soapy lacing caked to the glass.

Aroma offers sticky fresh peach lightly contrasted by tart cherry skins to start, with lemon pound cake and touches of honeyed sweet cream and blueberry developing in the background; a medicinal hop middle guides into bitter grapefruit and fresh-cut grass for a bit more depth to the close.

Taste brings fresh white peach and orange pulp to a forefront accented with herbal strawberry as a smattering of medicinal hops are spread throughout the profile; doughy lemon cake alongside hints of blueberry and grapefruit lead into an exhale of sweet malts and saturated tropical fruits.

Mouthfeel shows an increasingly sticky body on the lighter end of medium, cut effectively spritzy fluff of moderate carbonation creating a semi-creamy grit and dryness; stickiness resumes from the mid-palate onward while drying slightly into the swallow.

Undeniably sweet and far from perfect, this one wafts another one of SoPro's ever-eclectic bouquets as a guiding force into yet another unique and wholly enjoyable display of hops from this brewery.

 

Canned 1/5/20.
Parish Teku.

Hazy but not creamy opaque glowing gold body with a creamy white head of 3 fingers, receding to 1 finger, leaving neat hills of lace up the sides connected to the head.

Aromas of pineapple juice and tropical V8, some slight passion fruit, wild cherry, fruit salad, and trailings of grapefruit juice.

Flavors of grapefruit peel, bitter mango sherbet, hop dust, slight onion, and tangerines. The bitter mango sherbet hangs on quite a bit after the swallow, it's an herbal-fruity-slightly-spearminty weirdness, and is nearly too-sweet-too-bitter (which I'm never a fan of), but it still works. Sweaty funky fruit comes in halfway through the can and stays on the palate. Cool.

Feel is juicy and acidic, has a good medium body with a good amount of creaminess. Quite a bit of alcohol heat for a 6%'er.

Overall, Southern Prohibition is making some really wonderful stuff. This one comes in quite a bit underneath Crowd Control for me, but is still class act NE IPA. The south knows what they're doing. Now if only the northern great plains could get it together.

 

 

 

 

It poured a hazy, somewhat cloudy golden color with thick white head with an elegant lacking in the glass. The arouma is very citrus, the feel is somewhat heavy but easy to drink. The flavor is where it shines, a sweetness that gives way to notes of a hop bite, not overpower but balanced. One excellent and we'll made drink.

Hazy light yellow gold color with good cap and lacing.

Aroma of ripe citrus and sweet pear with a floral edge.

Taste on entry is sweet caramel malt with enough citrusy hops to notice but the feel is of balance between grain and malt. Good hop flavor with a noticeable lack of bitterness. I think the sweetness may also be toning down the hop bite as well. It's not a marked sweetness, just something that rounds things out.

Medium full texture with balancing carbonation.

It is, quite simply, a very drinkable IPA with low bitterness and a touch of sweetness.

CAN:

Mellow juicy flavours and hints of tropical fruit (e.g. passionfruit) are the emphasis in this pleasant ale. Pale malt and 2-row keep it balanced, but hop bitterness is minimal off the bat. Orange juice, tangerine, mango. I think I find some lactose sugar-like sweetness and yogurty notes, neither of which helps this.

Texture is juicy and refreshing. Smooth (from oats), wet, medium-bodied, well-carbonated. Not oily, scratchy, astringent, harsh, rough, or boozy.

A drinkable IPA with minimal hop bitterness and wanting hop pungency/depth of hop flavour. I do like the hop profile, but it's nothing stand-out in the contemporary oversaturated IPA market. Drinks more like a pale ale, and I'd like to see them drop the lactose, but while I wouldn't buy it again given the myriad superior expressions of the style out there, I'll enjoy working my way through the sixer and it's definitely reasonably priced for what it is.

High C+ (3.25) / ABOVE AVERAGE

***
03/17/20 can on St. Patrick's Day:

Dry-hopped with Mosaic, El Dorado, and Motueka. "This brew utilizes a mixture of lactose, oats, wheat, and barley to create a full and smooth base for this soft and juicy IPA. We use our hand-picked Mosaic hops in the whirlpool to help create a soft yet fruity experience."

Quite creamy from the lactose sugar, which also bolsters its sweetness. Has an unpleasant candied flavour throughout and the mouthfeel is a bit too thin...it's tough to latch onto given its slipperiness (from oats and lactose) on the palate and lack of firm body.

A bit yogurty. Vague tropical fruit. Subtle pear.

Fails to showcase Mosaic well; this lacks Mosaic's signature subtle blueberry flavour.

This IPA has a pleasant hop profile but it's a bit lacking in terms of depth of flavour and hop pungency, tasting less committed to its hop varietals than, say, Sierra Nevada's Pale Ale is to Cascade or Lagunitas IPA is to its hop extract. The use of lactose and oats doesn't elevate the beer above its brethren and ends of feeling more gimmicky than essential.

Drinkable but not Southern Prohibition's best work.

C+ / ABOVE AVERAGE

 

I tried this at the Loda BierGarten in downtown Mobile, AL whilst there on business. The beer poured a hazy golden with thin white head that left some lace. The scent had faint hints of citrus fruit. The taste was nicely balanced and easy to drink with subtle sweetness to start then a bitter citrus finish. The mouthfeel was lighter in body with good carbonation. Overall its a solid beer.

Altered Beast has a thick, off-white head, a milky gold appearance, with lots of bubble action and heavy glass lacing. The aroma is of grains and some fruit. The flavor is of fruit salad, a grain mix, cream, and low-to-moderate bitterness. Mouthfeel is high medium, and Altered Beast finishes medium dry.

RJT

First had at the 2019 Mississippi Craft Beer Festival, poured from 12-oz. can, bottom stamped (apparently) canned on “05/22/19,” into taster glass, and have had since poured from like can into tulip pint.

As the “altered” successor to SoPro’s mid-range IPA Salad Days, the Beast is still a substantial but quaffable 6.10 ABV due to the same grain bill, oats, wheat and barley, but is the beneficiary of a hop adjustment and a little lactose, has fruit characteristic of a traditional eastern IPA, and an effervescent hop finish over the creamy base.

 

 

The coloration on this beer is golden yellow and opaque, with a soft white head of foam that rises quietly above the beer. As it settles, thin layers of lace cling to the inside of the glass.

For a beer with such an aromatic array of hops, the result for me was candy sweet.To clarify, notes of mango and bubblegum ring true, really making way for a bit of a green hop bite that follows as the beer had some time to open up.

Very juicy flavors on the palate, loaded with notes of pineapple and citrus. A mild herbaceous quality sneaks up in the late innings, but the overall profile here is very well rounded.

The oats and lactose really shine here in making this beer very soft. That is to say, it drinks very smooth, with a low, effervescent carbonation. This only helps to amplify the crushable mouthfeel. On the tail there is very little residual bitterness.