Was Tap 5 the original NEIPA?

I had same experience with Heady Topper that some batches were hazy, some were almost beyond turbid. Once I cloned and started using Conan myself I attributed it to the nature of the yeast, which was finicky to say the least, but I really have no idea why at times there was such a marked batch difference. I have to admit I do chuckle to myself when I read folks saying Heady wasn't/isn't really that hazy of a beer..

 

Well Dave, FWIW I have had Heady Topper a fair number of times (over a dozen different drinking experiences over many years) and none of those beers were very hazy in appearance. I should caveat that I did leave a tiny bit of beer in the bottom of the can (sort of a decant).

Cheers!

 

Well, Jack, considering I have gone full green and drive less than 1K miles a year now, I am a bit embarrassed to admit all the trips I and friends made to Vermont, including annual week long camping trip to Waterbury, and also to admit I had a friend whose side business was to bring Heady from Vermont to NYC and sell it for 10.00 a can, and I happen to be exactly on the way down, so he shared quite a number of cans on his trips. I hope you don't think I am bragging, but just stating fact, that I have tried Heady VERY MANY more times than you, starting back in the pub days.

Some more helpful input from you would be conjectures why some batches were so turbid, and others weren't, rather than comparing your few experiences to my many. Any ideas?

 

Dave, I made the above post just to provide some additional context to why some folks (e.g., me) might opine that Heady Topper is not a murky beer. I have zero interest in having a 'contest' on who has more experience drinking Heady Topper.

 

Is Tap 5 the Hopfenweiss.

I always thought Heady Topper was the OG NEIPA

 

Coincidentally, some Hopfenweisse recently showed up at my usual store. My Schneider date code info seems out of date, so I don't know the actual bottling date of it. Given this thread, it seemed like a good opportunity to revisit a comparison tasting with IPAs. This time around, I included Heady Topper due to the thread, plus one beer that felt like an indisputable NEIPA, and another that felt like a West Coast IPA with some tropical character. This felt like the perfect lineup of contrasts.

In the end, all of the beers were easily recognizable in a blind tasting. The Hopfenweisse felt much more yeast driven than the companions. It's worth emphasizing that the three IPAs were very distinct from each other. The lower ABV of Hop Hunter made it a bit of an outlier though.

 

Love the brewer as Tap 6 Aventinus is still my favorite desert island beer of all time and the brewer is great with everything I've tried and I could not find a review where I have had Tap 5 so I will have to add this to the wants list as I'm a fan and a fan of the implied style similarity brought to light by the OP.