Blind IPA tasting - 2/22/14

I don't usually start threads in the main beer forum, but given the IPA-heavy nature of BA I thought most would find this interesting.

My friend and I did a blind taste test of 8 IPAs last night, where we ranked the group and then took a guess as to which one was. Our lineup consisted of (in tasting order - though we didn't know it at the time) :

• Ballast Point - Sculpin - IPA
• Laurelwood - Workhorse - IPA
• Lagunitis - Sucks - DIPA
• Knee Deep Brewing - Simtra - TIPA
• Victory - Dirt Wolf - DIPA
• Boneyard - Hop Venom - DIPA
• Russian River - Pliny the Elder - DIPA
• Dogfish Head - 90 Minute - DIPA

I thought it was a really solid lineup. Being from Oregon, it was nice to have a a few east coast IPAs in there to gauge the difference.

We tried to find the freshest bottles we could: Pliny was a week old (Friend just got back from PtY release), Sculpin was 4 weeks old, Simtra was 2 weeks old, Dirt Wolf had an enjoy by date at the end of April, Laurelwood was 4 weeks old, Lagunitis we couldn't find the date, but I imagine it was relatively fresh considering the source, 90 minute we couldn't find the bottling date, and Boneyard does not bottle so this was from a growler.

It was a really interesting experience trying to pick out what beers I thought i knew and being surprised by others. Well with no further ado, the my rankings are below.

1. Boneyard Hop Venom (To me this wasn't close)
2. Knee Deep Simtra (This was really great. The 11 percent alcohol is hidden so well)
3. Pliny the Elder - (No comments necessary)
4. Laurelwood Workhorse - (This is an everyday IPA from Portland, $8 for a 6 pack)
5. 90 Minute (Very sweet, almost cloying taste. Never had it before - wasn't that impressed)
6. Lagunitis Sucks (Just wasn't that good comparatively, on par with 90 minute)
7. Ballast Point Sculpin - (Just wasn't that good comparitively)
8. Victory Dirt Wolf - (consensus was this tasted and smelled like acrid baby vomit. I had it once before and it tasted exactly the same but thought it was an infected bottle so thought I would give it another chance. Still tasted like putrid garbage)

Well there you have it. My friend's ranking was similar, though he had 1. Knee Deep edging out 2. Hop Venom, and Laurelwood in 3rd. He thought Pliny would rank much higher, but it came in 5th for him. Funny how these things work.

Thoughts? Have y'all done Blind Taste tests?

 

Honestly, It HAS to be infected. Nobody could put liquid in a bottle that tasted that bad - It was disgusting.

Anybody know anything about infected bottles? How it happens, what tastes it gives off?

 

How can i be partial, when this was blind?

 

Which of my list have you had?

 

I understand and appreciate your clarifying question. Obviously if I had the beers before, I could pick out the ones I know and then make my responses lean in the favor of Oregon beers because obviously I give a shit about people on BA knowing that Oregon beers are awesome. Now that I say it out loud, I just sound crazy.

Of my list, here are the ones I have had before

• Ballast Point - have had before, maybe 6 months ago
• Laurelwood - have had before multiple times
• Lagunitis - have had once before maybe 3 months ago
• Knee Deep Brewing - never had
• Victory - Had once, see posts above
• Boneyard - had once maybe a year ago
• Russian River - have had a couple times before, maybe 4 months ago
• Dogfish Head - never

My friend and I placed our guesses next to what we thought were the correct beers. We were all over the map as to what our guesses were. Some were right, probably due to luck more than anything - most were wrong.

To further nail down this point, I have leaned away from IPAs in the past year or so - more focused on sours and saisons. My memory isn't that good to recall these beers.

 

I had the same thought about Sculpin - I remember really enjoying it when I had it. I was really hoping to find a can of it for the tasting, but only could get a bottle - I think that makes a difference. I also thought that palate fatigue would play a bigger role, but we had sculpin 1st, Boneyard 6th, Sucks 3rd. It was all over the board.