India Pale Lager
Swiftwater Brewing Company

This one was served on draught at Swift Water Brewing Company in Rochester, New York. It arrived in a house Weizen glass, showing a golden cellophane coloring. It held a greasy one finger head of tense white bubbles that retained well. Rings of lacing were left in its wake. No haze or sediment was appreciable, and carbonation appeared to be lighter. The aroma remained grain forward, with sugary sweet pale and caramel maltiness, raw corn and corny adjuncty grain, and millet seed. This blend came together with mustard seed, fresh grassy and heavily citric hoppiness, lime zest and oiliness, aluminum, light plastic phenols, heavily metallic and irony lager yeastiness, European caramel candies, dried maple syrup candy, cold glass, sweet alcohol, and chemical stings of printer ink. Following through on the sip came that same sweet and sticky caramel and toasty pale graininess, but in a heavier, ale-type quality, along with hotter twangs of pilsner and flakey golden malts, more syrupy tropical nectary and citric hops, orange peel bitters, Rice Krispies and Corn Flake cereal graininess, light lactic bite, browned grass, cotton, white flour, shaving gel bitters, mineral water, and sweaty saltiness. The body had a thicker mediumness to it, while the carbonation held a lower carbonation, but each bubble was hot. Each sip gave heavy slurp and smack, with lighter creaminess or frothiness. This evened out to a moderately coating beverage, with oiliness left to the lips and the back of the throat. No real dryness here. The abv was appropriate, and the beer sipped a little slower than the average.

Overall, this was a surprisingly tasty offering. This is not to say that we had low expectations or anything like that, but just found it to be a robustly flavored beer, with a heavy hoppy component, and thicker, more syrupy feel about it. The base lager grain profile tended to the sweeter side, so this made it easy for hops to float overtop them, for a brighter, freshness. The heavier feel, on the other hand, laid down groundwork for these stronger flavors to sink into. It cushioned them, helping them present to the forefront of the palate. Despite the fact that this is a more peripheral style of beer, this is probably one of the beer Swift Water beers we’ve had. It is thoughtful, thoroughly executed, and cleanly appealing.