Cucapa Brewing Co. - Chupacabras Pale Ale

Hey guys! It's Monday night and even though it's June 3rd, tonight is starting Tastes Like Beer's venture into the world of Pale Ales. My plan is to review a "new" pale ale for each entry into the blog this month. My goal is to sort of find the best Pale Ale I can find in the area (northern san diego). This isn't necessarily going to be the best pale ale on the planet because there's not enough days in the month... or year for that matter.

So without any further distractions, let's get into tonight's beer. Tonight I'm drinking a beer from Mexico! That's right, and it's not a Corona! Tonight we've got a beer from Cerveza Cucapa, this is their Chupacabras Pale Ale.

Now I'll admit right now, I bought this beer because the label has what resembles a Murloc from World of Warcraft. Being a former WoW dork, this instantly stood out to me. This is a 5.8% abv Pale Ale. Looking at their website this is an American Pale ale with dark caramel, dark chocolate and roasted nut aromas. Wait. In a pale ale? OK. Let's get this poured and see if that is actually the case.

The Chupacabra pours out a really nice golden orange/copper color with a massive 3 fingers of a very fluffy, billowy white head. The head on this sticks around for sometime and leaves behind a somewhat disappointing lacing. There's quite a bit of carbonation streaming up the sides of the glass. The ale is pretty clear as well. It's a pretty standard looking Pale ale to be honest. Let's get the aroma... maybe we'll get some of that dark chocolate? We'll see.

First thing I'm picking up on the Chupacabras Pale Ale is a nice citrus aroma. A bit of orange, grapefruit, maybe some tangerine as well. I'm getting a subtle banana character as well. Definitely not bordering on belgian like, but definitely a hint of it. I am picking up some of that nutty character the website describe. Maybe a roasted almond character? It's not overly present but it's lingering in the background. Not really getting any of the dark chocolate they mention but I am getting a little bit of caramel sweetness. I'd say it's a pretty decent smelling pale ale. Let's see how the Goat Sucker drinks!

Right away there's a nice hop bitterness. Definitely not on the level of an IPA but sort of like a Sierra Nevada hop bitterness. After that I get some caramel sweetness to sort of cleanse the pallet from the bitterness. It's creamy and rich. After the fades I get a touch of citrus bitterness. Like a grapefruit peel, maybe a slight orange pith character. This finishes pretty dry. There's a lot of bitterness here more so than the sweetness I got early on.

So overall, this is a pretty decent Pale Ale. A nice start to Pale Ale month. If you see this around it's worth a try. It was very reasonable in price ($5 I think) and isn't awful. For a country that's known more for Corona and Dos Equis this is definitely a refreshing change of pace.

Rating: B