Following on from the review of Einstok’s Toasted Porter, here’s is a brief summary of the IPA from the same stable (I being for Icelandic, of all the plays on the IPA acronym, possibly not the one that would immediately spring to mind, but nice all the same).
So, it’s lively out of the bottle, presumably being bottle conditioned, and then into the glass too. But the head dies quickly. I’m not sure what that means but I’ve seen other reviewers mention it so I thought I’d include it (professional aren’t I?!).
Pale ale, crystal and chocolate malts give it an unusually dense underlying malty taste for an IPA. American and Bavarian hops give it the expected US crafty beer taste but with a hint of lager about it. It’s not as hoppy as I’d like but probably not surprising given its somewhat
lower strength for an IPA (5.4%).
General taste is pretty smooth (as their website suggests) and has hints of banana in the nose but not on the palate (I’m really dishing out these words like I know what I’m talking about). Aftertaste is a little thin but would make it a generally more appealing to a bigger market I think.
It’s not a super aggressive IPA like some of the stronger ones I’ve tasted lately by any means but I think that works for it from a regular/easy drinking perspective. I’ll certainly be a regular consumer that’s for sure. But then it is the only beer I can buy given I do all my grocery shopping in Harvey Nick’s these days.
(insert another “mum’s gone to Iceland” joke here)
