Double Vision
Moonlight Brewing Company

This was my third beer of the day on a day trip around Sonoma County, ordered at the Sonoma Wine exchange in Sonoma itself. My previous beer was a 20 once of Pliny the Elder, so when I ordered this beer I was excepting a lager of some sort...i had no idea I was about to get another DIPA. Since I just had Pliny I sort of kept comparing the two in my mind. Mabey not fair but that's what i did. They are very similar in many ways.
Appearance: Dark straw color, or light brown. Looks just like Pliny the elder. It has a small decent head.
Smell: hoppy, hoppy and more hoppy. Nice.
Taste: The malt profile is very similar to Pliny the Elder. The hops is where these two beers differ. With Pliny the Elder the defining feature is the hop flower taste and not nessarily the bitterness. This beer was more about straight up bitterness. I'm pretty sure the IBU's were above 100. The beer danced the line between just enough bitterness I could handle and too much bitterness. In the end it was so, so bitter. I couldn't really taste much else the rest of the day...food or anything. One the most bitter beers i've tried but still enjoyed.
mouthfeel: felt pretty thick. Filling and the hop bitterness attacks the sides of your mouth and back of your tounge.
drinkability: half a pint of this would have been enough for me. This is an agressive beer that can't be drank too fast. It's a slow, slow sipper.

It's worth a try as are all Moonlight beers. Some will stick and some won't.

This arrived as a nice pale blend of yellow and orange, with a small head that lasted well. The lace looks good too.

The smell is very nice. It's a big hit of hops, but it does not seem dominated by any one flavor normally associated with powerful hops. The mix is great. The taste is good too, being full of flavor up front and bitter through the finish. The mouthfeel is just a little too thin, while the drinkability is high.

It's very smooth for the style.

02/05/05- On tap at the Toronado in San Francisco.

Presentation- Poured into a regular glass pint.

Appearance- Cloudy golded hued liquid with a small tight creamy head and decent lacing.

Smell- Typical DIPA scents here. Lots of pine and grapefruit, with that nice sweet cotton candy scent thrown in for good measure.

Taste- Hmmm, I had this one a few weeks ago as my last beer. I'd already had two big beers....Delerium Noel and Pliny the Younger and I thought this was freakin incredible. Even though I didn't think I would have had any buds left over after Pliny. Well, this time it was good, better than good, but not as incredible as last time. Maybe I need to recharge my buds. The fruits seemed a bit subdued. They didn't come out in aggression as I thought they did the week before. Still very good bitter and creamy grapefruit and a tad sweet to back it up.

Mouthfeel- Definitely creamy, but a tad watery. A bit of a thin mouthfeel. Not greaty watery, but enough to notice. Fairly low to medium carbonation.

Drinkability- Hmmm, I may need to get this one yet again to give final judgment. Pretty good DIPA, just not enough shabang for it's buck. Still would get this one over many others I have tried.

Edit:

Had this brew once more and indeed, I think my buds just needed a recharge. This time it was the first beer I had and I was overwhelmed from the hops. High octane brew I thought until I saw the abv was only in the 7% range. Very deceiving brew. Kicking this reveiw up a notch.