Snow Paws
Lead Dog Brewing

nice milkshake beer not to sweet good vanilla taste

Sometimes I feel bad for a brewery when I'm writing a negative review. I don't think I ever feel bad about writing negative reviews about milkshake ipas though.

Pours golden with 2/3" white head, somewhere between clear and hazy. Between the ski imagery on the label and the beer itself, I'd say appearance is definitely this beer's best trait. The aroma is virtually all vanilla and zero hops. Certainly not what I'm looking for in an ipa, but somewhat respectable in that it appears to be what it aims to be.

Taste, guess what? More vanilla. Thoughts of doing a side by side taste with vanilla extract seem to just be doing the same thing twice here. Its way too sweet for my tastes, lacks hop character, lacks malt character, lacks yeast character. But if vanilla sweetness is your jam in an ipa than knock yourself out.

I could never imagine myself after a day on the slopes, at the bottom of Mt Rose, wanting to knock one of these back.

 

Appearance - Pours semi-hazy and golden yellow in color with a white, quarter finger width head. Fair retention before dying to a thin, broken layer of suds and a thin ring around the edge of the glass. Some small clumps and spotting makes up the lacing.

Smell - Pure creamy vanilla aroma. Pungent. Maybe a faint trace of hops, but vanilla dominates. Straight up vanilla ice cream.

Taste - Follows the nose, though to a lesser extent. Vanilla is still prominent, but hops come through with a light kiss of citrus. Not quite as 'sweet cream' as the nose leads on, but damn is it still good. Finish is a nice, steady vanilla sweetness, and that kiss of citrus becomes faint touch of acid in the aftertaste.

Mouthfeel - Medium-bodied with low-to-moderate carbonation. Nice creaminess. Easy drinker.

Overall - Damn, this is good. Maybe their 2nd best milkshake offering behind Oranges are Orange.