Simcopated Healing
Green Empire Brewing

Bought from The Beer Temple. This has 9% ABV and was canned over 11 months ago. But freshness nor alcohol are not the issues. This has a bitter after-taste to me. While I recognize bitter hops make this style popular, I like to own my buds and these bitter hops want to take over.

Simcopated Looks great, a luscious foam. Smells also allure with citrus and pine and a sweet malt backbone. In the attack, all seems integrated; but by mid-palate I start to doubt that and by the finish I know I do not have a balanced IIPA. How they can change it for People Like Me? Probably don't bother. I'm not a fan of the style and, regrettably, bought this because I like to try as many micros as I can for as long as I can in as many styles as I can. (Note: I'm also biased toward the Belgians and their inspired.)

As my nano-review for Green Empire, they are only four years old and while in the suburbs of the metropolis of Burlington, Green Empire is still remote. And their offerings are almost all hoppy, which I've never thought a good idea being 29 miles from Canada. But Green Empire is trying to expand the surrounding craft culture... so I give them average OA Hugs.

 

 

Canned 4/6/21; drank 4/30/21 @ Hannah & Kenser's.

Opaque dull orange appearance.

A rough pour yielded a big white head; thick, frothy tree-rung lace.

Table sugar, mild caramel & lemon notes in the nose.

Medium thick mouthfeel.

Stale lemon, table sugar & caramel flavors up front; slight fall leaf notes on the finish.

This looked the part of a NE IPA but tasted like an old-school take...and not a good one. Full pass moving forward.

 

 

 

 

 

Had this at Foam Brewing in Vermont during the October 2019 New England/New York trip.

Pours a light amber color, 1/2" white head. Aroma was nice, Mosaic definitely hit its passion fruit, mango, weed aromas here. Additional bitter chalk pee Simcoe note behind that.

Taste was good, you have the firm bitterness of Simcoe, but in a slightly unconventional way of thinking, that bittering hop gets balanced out by the Mosaic aroma hop's juiciness. I don't want my ipas balanced in the conventional way of thinking (malt/hops), but rather like this iteration, a balance of bitterness and juiciness flavor wise. The light malt bill that actually gives a good caramel/crystal shake works in a beer of this dimension. Like DDB said, what was once a pejorative has now turned into a positive. Hits of pine, caramel, mango, weed, but also a dry lightly toasted majority malt base that hid the alcohol quite well.

Look I dunno who these guys are, but this is a good beer, here you got a relatively harsh grader, something around a 3.51 average for almost 4500 reviews, saying this is a top notch beer made 3000 miles from home. Check it out.

 

 

 

A very nice beer that has good taste, doesn’t have the bite of an 8 percent beer and drinks very easily. Has a bit of a fruit feel to it, but not the sweetness you would expect.

 

On tap at Vermont Tap House, Williston, Vermont.
This was poured into a tulip.
The appearance was a clean semi-transparent copper color with a light carbonation rising at a moderate pace to fill a sheet of white foamy head that slid off fairly quick. Barely any lace.
The aroma shaped a nice balance of sweet pine to onion and citrus peel trying it's best to combine but seemed to hit at separate spots within this arrangement. Part of me wanted it a bit more blended, however, a noticeable cracker malt seemed to subside underneath.
The flavor presented a fair sweetness that blended the hops to the malts initially but in turn seemed to take the malts in with that "cracker-like" mentality and more or less seemed to "coincide" but not necessarily fully blend the way I would have liked. Nice clean hops to malt-like aftertaste.
The mouthfeel was about medium bodied with a fair sessionable to sipping trait to it. I didn't want to gulp this, but I didn't want to sip it too much (I want to say I once had a DIPA by Sixpoint like this 'session DIPA'). Carbonation felt fairly low yet nice. ABV felt on par.
Overall, it's that "game breaker" for Green Empire - I have tasted a fair amount of their beers and have thought, they're good, but they need something else to take them a bit 'further.' What is it? Well, this is that one that leaves me 'scratching my beard' thinking, hey, Green Empire is about to brew that beer that everyone should be watching out for. These guys stay on my radar!