Deep Fake
Flying Dog Brewery

Just an ok N.A. IPA. The aroma is great however. Super dank and weedy. Had to check label to make sure there wasn’t THC in it (there isn’t any). Recommend for the 4:20 crowd that doesn’t want alcohol.

A very good NA Ipa. Just became my favorite. Citrusy and hoppy. Does not have that strange after taste that many/most NA beers do. Well done!

Turbid yellow body under a medium size white head with spotty lacing. Aroma of lemon, a bit of grapefruit and a slight herbal edge. Taste shares that same attributes until grains add some balance. Well carbonated, light-to-medium bodied mouthfeel. Represents the style pretty well.

 

 

 

Smells, looks like an IPA. Tastes like a wheat beer. Not a fan. Sticking with athletic.

A very nice non- alcoholic beer. My friend, who stopped drinking after he had a health crisis introduced me to this beer. Good hoppiness with a touch of lemon on the palate. Aroma is very citrusy/lemony as well. An ugly hazy pale light than straw colored yellow. Pour head that disappears quickly. Almost radler-like.

 

 

After I got pancreatic cancer, I had part of that organ removed. It makes insulin and digestive fluids. Alcohol has been implicated in pancreatic cancer, so I've had to stop drinking it. I've therefore been searching for non-alcoholic IPAs that taste great. Athletic Run Wild was good for a while, but now that I've come across Deep Fake, I think I've found the holy grail. It is smooth like a hazy ipa and has a fruity but not cloying bouquet. It's a keeper. By the way, I've been cancer free for 3 years.

(12 oz can, ENJOY BY 07/23/22; purchased single off shelf... poured into a 14 oz mug)

L: hazy, bright yellow-amber liquid; beautifully curvy, dimpled, tight, white foam; only laces with effort (big sip)... keeps a thick, clongy collar

S: straight white grapefruit juice, period.

T: grapefruit juice up front, but quickly giving way to an almost Witbier-like, white-bready, wheaty malt foundation, with the spicy zing of the hops in the finish sort of mimicking the coriander and yeast spice of a Wit; grapefruit flesh and Wonder bread crumb aftertaste

F: well-carbonated, inflated attack, masking it's rather featherweight body... the citrus zesty hop bitterness does gradually sting and stun the tounge, almost chili-like, and it doesn't abate... fluffy, foamy, leaving a delicate film

O: this doesn't really taste like an IPA, maybe marginally a NE IPA, but it's too one-note compared to a good YA example... all things considered, it's a pretty tasty beverage, and it's a shame they had to label this an IPA, because it's really a very lovely blonde ale shandy (1944)

 

Poured from a can into a standard pint glass. Cascades slightly. Lots of active carbonation-- like A LOT. Thought it might be nitro driven carbonation, but it is not. That's a lot of C02 (shrug). Despite high carbonation average size foaming at the head. Builds a nice high crown to rim of the glass. Good uneven head with varied open and closes bubbles of multiple sizes. Reduces slowly, but surely to... nothing. Like gone. Nadda. Barely a ring around the glass in lacing. Quite the disappearing act. Active carbonation remains though. Lots of small bubbles riding the stairway to Heaven. Body is very opaque. Lots of varied beautiful hues of orange, brown, gold, yellow, amber and even some white. Looks like it should have a thick body and feel like syrup (spoiler alert... that doesn't happen). It is very pretty to look at though.

Smells of orange juice spritzer, some oatmeal cookies, vanilla, and Tang. A little lemon grass and wheat. Pleasing and fairly aromatic. You even get a hint of pine and lemon zest. Intermittent lactic acid. Surprisingly present in the nose and telling of the tasting note to come.

On the front palate, lots of orange juice spritzer (think fresh squeezed OJ and seltzer). Some lactic milky notes that lend a creamy vanilla and roasted malt backbone to the note. Some light lemon and grass notes. Mid-palate lots of wetness. Almost from a spritzer to watered down OJ. Lots of lactic notes-- milk in OJ is not the best combo, but somehow here it works because the OJ is so light the mildness almost creates a candy like cream vanilla with orange essence appearance to the tongue. Again I would think it should be horribly off putting, but it is not. Back palate is more water down very fizzy OJ with linger biscuit and tropical fruits (guava, star fruit, mango, tangerines, and lemon). After taste is very wet. The OJ/tropical fruit seem to dissolve in the wetness and leave a very watered down half and half taste behind. The overall taste note is extremely refreshing and pleasing BUT it is so very thin at times it is hard to appreciate it beyond it being more or less flavored orange essence seltzer. That is where though the note is very pleasing it is not very beer-like and more like a effervescent herbal ice tea. So there is your downside... good taste note that is not very beer like.

Mouthfeel is very thin. It is fizzy and very seltzer like. There is almost a velvet character to it similar to nitro carbonated beers (think Guinness or Old Speckled Hen). That velvet mouth feel at time quickly coats the tongue very fully and with the milk lactose notes seems like it should last forever... it doesn't though. It quickly fades in the wetness and doesn't have a clean edge to it making it just seem ever thinner beyond the initial front tongue feel. By the time it gets to the back of your throat all that velvet is gone with the carbonation. Your tongue is refreshed, but your mouth is no longer coated. Very weird mouthfeel. Not unpleasing, but again if that velvet feel stuck or if it was just wet upfront I think it would be less off putting.

Overall I think what Flying Dog is trying to do is replicate the "milkshake" style New England IPA taste you are seeing that are all the rage. The problem is the mouthfeel and taste notes are way thinner and wetter than those-- so you do not get that milkshake taste and feel even if from looking at it you'd expect it to have it. Now is that because of there being no alcohol to give it that extra feel and bite? I really don't think so. I look at some other NA beers (I'm looking at you Brew Dog Hazy AF) and it quite convincingly pulls it off with some out of the box use of oats, wheat, malt barley, and hop magic. So I think they could get the "thickness" addressed for mouthfeel pretty easily and honestly if you just ramp down the amount of carbonation a bit you might still get velvet mouthfeel and it might last more OR even go nitro. IDK... either way though I had to ding a few points off for not meeting the intended style even if I thoroughly enjoyed what Flying Dog is trying to do here. It looks amazing. It smells amazing. And it just falls a few points shy of meeting the milkshake IPA style standard (if there is one) so this ends up a 3.43 out of 5. If you did somehow get those few things...this would easily launch up to 3.75 or 4.

3.43 out of 5-- decent. Missed the mark on style tasting points, but still worth trying.

Looks like a NE IPA. Smells like a NE IPA. Its a great beer if you stop there. If I'd known that before dropping $12 on a six, I would have stopped there and went with an Athletic. I'm really enjoying the new ways people have have figured out to make a beer that tastes good without alcohol. I'm just disappointed to find that this isn't one of them. Flavor just isn't there, and I have to assume the high price is just to get idiots like me to think that means its going to be better.

Hazy yellow with a bit of an orange-brown tinge, white head, poor retention and lace
Orange and grapefruit zest aroma, a bit of sweet malt
Tea-like flavor, a bit of graininess, some citrus
Light bodied with low carbonation
Not my favorite N/A beer