HOPeration Smash
North American Craft (NAC Importers Inc.)

Got this from the LCBO this past summer

From a 473ml can into a snifter
IBU: 62

APPEARANCE: A clear pour yields a one finger, thicker, creamier white head with excellent retention. Hazy gamboge orange with no carbonation evident. Head recedes to a full wisp cap and clings to the glass. A splotchy wisp remains leaving some good lacing on the glass as it empties.

SMELL: Some honeydew melon, caramel, toffee and cantaloupe on the nose. Bolder with sweet candy aromas and melon.

TASTE: Melon with caramel and toffee sweetness up front. Some more sweetness at the swallow, moving into a bolder finish of honeydew, cantaloupe, caramel sweetness, with a decent dose of piney bitterness lingering on the palate. Bitter-sweet and flavorful.

PALATE: Medium body and medium carbonation. A little foamy perhaps, goes down okay and finishes a bit dry. Some bitterness lingers. Not quite as creamy as others in the style.

OVERALL: This is solid, and is another typical example of an Ontario IPA, which are usually rather melon and caramel forward. Sweeter initially but leads into a bitter-sweet finish. Enjoyable in its own right for sure. Cheers!

 

can: pours a lightly hazed pale gold with a massive lasting bone white cap....aromas of citrus, pine exotic fruits and malt sweetness....flavor is balanced piney hop astringency in the finish...sharp hoppy character...more of a craft IPA than a juicy murky NEIPA....a decent canned IPA for excursions afield

Pours cloudy orange with a creamy, thick head. Light pineapple, sweetish malts in the nose. Citrusy hops, an astringent bitterness and treacly maltiness in the taste. Plum brandy notes too. Medium bodied mouthfeel with prickly, coarse carbonation. Light astringent bitterness and sweet maltiness in the finish.

This IPA is very deficient in the hop department. There's also a crude, coarseness to the bitterness and too much sweetness. I would avoid.

 

 

 

 

operation Hops? no, Operation HopSmash. will this one live up to it’s adventerous names? Let us hope so....
Billed as a New England IPA, that is a high bar. can art is cutesy green and black. Poured from a 473mL into a tulip. Pours orange-gold with excellent collar. Decent efferversence here. Nose is weak here with some underlying oranges but stronger malt finish lingers. taste follows the nose with strong hop malt forefront, little fruit. Strong aftertaste here lingers with efferversence bubbling throughout. A lot of grass here.
Not one I will return to.

Full disclosure. I had just finished a Collective Arts Surround Sound Hop 2 when I decided I wanted another IPA & thought I would give this a try. Label said all the right things: NEIPA, numerous beer fests, made full use of Eldorado & comet hops, etc. Aroma was so disappointing upon opening. Little hop fruit; dominated by sweet/sour malt. I said out loud "let me guess, it's orange". Look was somewhat impressive after the aroma as I was expecting a clear orange dud like some other beers I've had which claim NEIPA on the label but just don't live up. Taste was uneven. Hints of decent hop flavour but sour malt takes precedence and there's even some metallic/adjunct/regular beer taste thrown in. Damn. I bought 2 of these. That's one too many. Still, taste is better than the smell. Mouthfeel is actually decent; full & smooth with good carbonation levels. Overall, a miss.

 

 

473 ml can served cold into a pint glass. LCBO purchase for $3.25 CDN.

Appearance - Fairly pale and standard golden and amber colored brew, with a little haze, but not nearly the amount I've become accustomed to seeing in a NEIPA. Head is a finger plus, retention is modest. Lots of debris in the glass, a touch off-putting for some.

Smell - Citrus, but a little more dank and piney that tropical and juicy. Also not absolutely filling my nostrils with tropical juices. More old school than I'd thought. Don't advertise as a NEIPA then.

Taste - Same as the nose, a little more pine and resin rather than robust sweet tropical juices as the bitterness is fine, but a bit much for this substyle and overall flavor is lacking in intensity.

Mouthfeel - Medium bodied, a touch sticky, lightly dry on the finish and the carbonation is pretty average.

Overall - Not to be a bearer of bad news, but this just misses the mark for me as it's a little more old school west coast pine resin IPA than tropical fruit juice haze bomb IPA. Gets some marks for being a decent enough beer, but in market well saturated with top notch IPA's this one falls just a bit short.

 

These beers from this brewery are not excellent, but they’re way better than you think they will be. Try them.
Dec 4 2018

473 mL can from the LCBO; can't read the date stamp. Served barely chilled.

This brew's body is cloudy in complexion, golden-yellow in hue, and rife with flecks of what I can only presume to be hop debris. One finger of soapy, frothy white head diminishes within several minutes' time, with a fat, foamy collar and lumpy cap lasting for some time longer; looks like it's supposed to, I guess, with its abundance of lovely lace. The aroma is understated but generally pleasing; I'm getting hints of pear, melon and apricot, as well as notes of lemongrass and grassy, herbal hops.

A decent, but timid IPA. There's some grainy, gritty wheat husk sweetness just beneath a calm sea of hop flavours that do lean towards the fruity side at first - pear, apricot, melon rind and hints of tangerine come to mind initially. However, by mid-sip they start to be displaced by some grassy, herbal lemongrass notes that eventually wind up dominating the tail end of the sip. Moderately bitter finish, with more lemongrass/herbal notes carrying on briefly into an earthy aftertaste that doesn't quite suit its purported NE IPA style. Medium in body, with moderate carbonation levels that supply a gentle bite to this brew's soft, smooth mouthfeel. I found it rather easy to drink, but your mileage may vary.

Final Grade: 3.58, a B grade. HOPeration Smash isn't exactly a bad beer, but taken as a New England IPA I find that it mostly misses the mark. I actually did enjoy the grassy and herbal contributions of the Comet hops, but they're not really what I'm looking for in this type of beer. The fruity, juicy elements are present only to a thin, near-ephemeral degree, and the back end in particular is totally lacking in juiciness - the end result being that this is just not a particularly good interpretation of an NE IPA. I doubt I'll return to this again soon, but don't let that stop you from deciding for yourself.

Hop smash? I think not. This is a very middle of the road beer, that might even lean toward weak. The look is okay, the smell is a little hoppy but it fades very fast. The taste is hops, sweet malts and a vegetal presence. Feel is just sort of there.

This isn't a great beer. I can't believe I'm saying this, but I wish it was more like their Trailer Park Boys Green Bastard. Sad, right?

It looks like a hazy Vermont IPA but tastes like a can of grass clippings. The date code was illegible but I assume it was fresh because it is a new release. Bought out of the LCBO in the GTA, I don't know why I expected good beer from this company...