3 The Hard Way
Mast Landing Brewing Company

From a 16oz can, undated, purchased at the brewery three days ago. Served in an imperial pint pub glass.

Pours a hazy, opaque, dull orange-gold with two-plus fingers of bubbly, lathery, pouffy, ivory-coloured head. Retention is excellent and leaves slippery gobs of lacing.

The nose is a melange of your sweeter, juicier tropical fruits, pineapple, mango, peach and what-have-you. Lightly sweet, vanilla-y, dreamy.

A densely malty brew loaded with heavy pineapple, grapefruit pith and vanilla cream. The juiciness dial is cranked hard over to the right but with real, honest satisfying bitterness into the finish and beyond.

I want to say that the feel is both clean-and-quenching and smooth-and-creamy, both at the same time, even though that's maybe a contradiction. Probably medium-heavy bodied but aggressive carbonation makes it feel lighter.

Overall, a very most satisfying beer. One of my favourite things is when an IPA manages to balance the new-fangled juiciness with the old-school bitterness - which is something that Mast Landing often does particularly well.

Pours an opaque muted yellow gold with a 3 finger biscuit head that leaves great lacing on the way down.

Aroma is pungent with notes of orange, grapefruit and nectarine - not too sweet smelling, more tangy.

Taste does have a nice mellow sweetness to it up front with tropical fruit notes that are cut into rather quickly by the moderate bitterness that takes over midway through. There's a heaviness to the flavor that may speak to a slightly higher malt content than many of this category but really this is very hop forward.

The feel is very soft with a thick, heavy mouthfeel. Bitterness is higher than typical for a NEIPA and there is a definite alcohol burn behind it but the flavors counteract it well.

This is a pretty damn good double NEIPA that looks and feels great but there is a little off on the flavor for me like it is a bit muddled. Really it is worth the try so don't hesitate.