Chicagoland NE IPAs (2018)

Just came across this,probably one of the first YouTube reviews of Hop Butcher

Peter (Master of Hoppets) has been doing beer reviews for a long long time and is very familiar with the American craft beer scene.

 

Opened my growler of Ghost Tropic last night. Its pretty damn phenomenal.

The mouthfeel and look are perfect in my opinion. Its a gorgeous fucking beer. Everything I look for in a NE style in those regards. The taste however could use maybe a few small tweaks. Didn't start getting a lot of flavors until it started to warm. The armoa started to really shine once the temperature dropped a bit too. Would be interesting to see how the beer evolves in the next week or two.

I love what Forbidden Root is doing @BJP. You have a great space and are making an incredibly high quality product again and again.

 

Maplewood's Pride Pants (Love Wins) was a nice surprise. Still a little thin, per their style it seems. Very fruit forward (raspberries, strawberries, and blackberries I believe) definitely didn't make it feel like a NE IPA. But super refreshing and tasty anyways.

 

Any other spots in the city or burbs get cans from these guys?

 

Binnys Grand got a decent amount of the Dank Meme and Neo. Neo isn't in system till Tuesday but Meme is out on the floor..

Anyone try the HC IIPA Citra?

Snoochie cans are getting better every time I have one. I think Peak may be this week/weekend between the 2-3 week mark is my ideal for cans.

Lucifer in Haze any good?

 

Thanks. Guess I'm heading there Tuesday haha. I really enjoyed Lucifer in Haze.

 

Cool. Neo is worth trying to grab for sure. I shared an Xhops Pink after having a can of Neo yesterday. Granted, Pink is 2+ months past bottling, but i think Neo was as good...maybe better than Pink in its current state.

Also, curious as to what the inscription is on the bottom of Dank Meme? I haven't picked any up as my fridge currently has some PA/IPA/IIPA real estate related issues it's working through.

 

The inscription reads SAVE FERRIS

 

Beer Cellar and the 4 downtown Binny's are the places that got some this last weekend... we'll be brewing Neo again but I'd like to push it much further into the fruity direction. We used almost exclusively LupuLN2 powder and the Mosaic powder wasn't anywhere near as fruity as the Mosaic pellets we typically use are, even at an obscene usage rate. It's definitely a WIP.

 

Thanks for dropping these in Chicago! I'm in love with Dank Meme. I hope find some cans of Neo.

 

Hubbards Cave new Citra offering is fire. Love the bite at the end. Recommend stopping by the taproom, and/or grabbing a bottle through distro this week. The last three IPAs from Hubbards have all been wonderful. They are in the Corridor/Forbidden Root/Noon Whistle (also SOME Mikerphone) territory for best NE IPA producer in Chicagoland. Cheers.

 

I'm going to get one but I thought Mosaic was bad.the beer turns vegetal so fast!! I don't know why?

 

You guys drop a lot at Beer Cellar, hoping to grab today from them if they have it!

 

Strange, I had 3 bottles of the Mosaic and thought it was stellar.

 

Pretty sure it's long gone. I went in after work on Friday for the Snoochie 4-packs and didn't see any Triptych cans. I could be wrong though, as I was only there for one thing

 

damn im sure snoochie is long gone as well

 

Yep, unfortunately the 12 or 13 cases were all gone in a short time. It sounds like Neo hasn't gone out on the shelves yet at Binny's because of a pending UPC authorization though... and I was mistaken, drops were done at 3 Binny's with the one on Grand getting a double-drop.

 

Definitely. I stopped in just after 5 on Friday and there were only two 4-packs left as I was checking out.

 

I really like Neo. I think with some tweaking, like you said dial down bitterness a bit and increase juiciness, you're on to something top rate.

 

Yeah, the dust in the dry hop added a very significant bitterness that wasn't there earlier, we'll fix that on the next run.