Solar Moment
Brick & Feather Brewery

Draught @ The Foundry: This one pours a murky orangish straw color. There was a fair amount of an off white head. The nose is good. Orangy, earthy and other hop notes. The taste is also quite good. Orange, pine, malts, some bitterness. Quite nice!

 

 

From a 32oz growler, filled this afternoon at the brewery. (With special thanks for accommodating above-and-beyond). Served in a spiegelau.

Pours a gloriously ugly, thick and turbid dull orange, with a pillowy three-finger head of soft, creamy suds. Retention is good, in the several minute range, leaving a heavy ring of foam and a spotty network of lacing which sheets down the sides.

Smells of oranges and cake, leafy, minty herbs, and dank, like suntan lotion and sex on an unwashed beach towel. Hugely aromatic.

The taste comes as a complete surprise because, from the nose, I was expecting sweet fruity and dank and that is not what this beer delivers except maybe the dank - it is dry and bitter and, while the signature Brick & Feather sugar cookie body is there, it's a sugar cookie baked with entire macerated lemons and grapefruits, pith, peel, pulp, seeds, the works. Finishes quick and clean.

While the beer looks like you could stand a spoon up in it, it is really no more than medium bodied and the carbonation is precisely calibrated to perfectly complement its dry, drying high alpha acid, citric bitterness - I'm going to go ahead and believe that this was not a happy accident and that you are, in actual fact, just that good.

Overall, while this is not going to be everyone's cup of tea owing to its near-epic bitterness, to my hop-junkie palate it's excellent. Furthermore, aside from the taste and disregarding that I described the smell (in part) as 'unwashed beach towel,' this is easily in my top-five best smelling beers of all time. If I could only keep from drinking it, I could happily just sit and sniff at it all night.

 

Poured from a growler filled at the brewery.

Pours a hazy orange straw color with a finger of bright white head. The head settles into a halo around the beer, leaving some splotchy lacing as it dissipates.

The aroma is daaaank. The kind of dankness only brought forth by simcoe and columbus hops. And weed. It's just grassy, earthy, and piney, with a touch of peppery spice and grapefruit.

The flavor starts off with some pine and grapefruit, followed by some orange peel and spicy black pepper. Has a very strong malt backbone, with saltine crackers on the finish.

The feel is medium bodied with lively carbonation. Crisp, yet smooth and creamy with a dry finish.

Overall, a very good IPA that is exceptionally well-balanced. It's also quite drinkable despite the higher ABV.