Leo the First
2C Family Brewing Company

Crowler from brewery. Medium golden pour with small frothy head. Aroma is light Belgian yeast. Taste is grassy, sweet, some honey, smidge bitter. Almost there

a belgian style imperial ipa. i love hoppy belgian beer when done right, and there isnt nearly enough of it around, so i am excited to have these guys in the local mix here playing around with these styles, but this one to me was very obviously a batch one, a starting point, not one that is yet at its full potential i dont reckon, at least i hope not. its not bad, but the yeast is a little generic and a little overdeveloped in here, which comes at the expense of the hops in the aroma and flavor, so we end up with a real estery beer that has a lot of bitterness, but there is a flavor gap, and balance needs work here. its a familiar strain too, not unique enough at all to be interesting, so i want perfect execution with it, and its a ways off from that. i can taste quite a bit of the alcohol on this as well, which i dont mind in a strong example of the style like this, but the beer just seems to be exposed a bit and lacking refinement. this is a risky style no doubt, a tough beer to execute even with simple ingredients and processes, it takes a little more attention to detail than is on display here. i dont even mind this being hazy, actually think that offers some potential for new flavors and textures in a belgian ipa, but this one needs some fine tuning. spicy, soapy, floral, bitter, and slightly phenolic. not there yet but i appreciate the effort...