Tropic Thunder
Little Miss Brewing

On tap at Little Miss.
Brassy hue. Solid white fluff. Good retention. Layered lacing.
Piney. Hints of orange. Mild breast notes underneath.
Flavor is straight forward old school, pine and citrus, meets tropical nuances of pineapple and hints of berry.
Mouthfeel is fine for style.

 

 

Purchased from the local Escondido brewpub. Got it canned, as the bar has a constant rotation that mercifully doesn’t overwhelm their menu with seven-thousand variations of IPA. That said, one of their first canned beers is exactly that style. Poured from a can into a pint glass.

Look—This beer looks the part. It’s mostly transparent, colored like wet straw. It pours for an enormous foamy head that doesn’t dissipate immediately. Lots of lacing.

Smell—You can smell malt beneath the obvious hop-bomb. It’s grassy, but there’s a very mild sour milk smell way down deep. Not sure I like that.

Taste—The bitterness is dry and flat over genuine roast malt and some acetone. It’s weird because as prominent as the hops are, they taste like a a light coating over the malt and it balances well. The balance doesn’t hide the booziness, but this isn’t like a a Dogfish Head high-test IPA where the perfect balance hides the alcohol while dominating with hops. Booziness plays its part, and I have to say it really adds to the style for me, as I’m generally not a fan of the most extremely hopped IPAs.

Feel—The booziness cuts through the prickliness here. This obviously changes over the course of drinking the beer. It’s much pricklier when the carbonation is most pronounced at the beginning of drinking. It feels “wetter” near the end, and a touch of booze fire (only a touch) can be felt.

Overall? 4.5 out of 5, but keep in mind I LIKE the variations on the style that purists may not.