Left Coast Brewing Co - Hop Juice

Hey all! It's Tuesday night and I'm in the mood for something new. Well, I should rephrase that. This isn't exactly new. At least I don't think it is. I vaguely remember having this beer several years ago, back before I could appreciate good beer. I don't remember anything about this other than I've once tried it. 

What's that? What beer? Oh, tonight I'm drinking another beer from Left Coast Brewing out of San Clemente, CA. This is Hop Juice, a 9.7% abv Double IPA. Yep, still sticking with the hops here. C'mon, I'm in San Diego. Would you expect anything less?? 

So lets get the Hop Juice open and see if it's as good as I don't remember... 

Hop Juice pours out a really deep copper, rust, orange, amber color. Very much clear, not much haze at all. There was about a finger and a half of a very thick, fluffy looking white head. Lots of bubbles in here. The Hop Juice head doesn't linger around very long and leaves behind a very thick and sticky lacing. There's not a lot of carbonation streaming up from the bottom of the glass. I'm guessing just based on looks that this is going to be a thick, heavy DIPA. Let's get the nose. 

Tons of syrupy peach sweetness. I mean, TONS! I'm also getting some mandarin orange, mango, papaya like fruits. There's a lot of caramel and malt sweetness. Very potent. Honestly, the nose is pretty much what I was expecting just from looking at this beer in the glass. Surprisingly, I'm not picking up a lot of hop bitterness so this might not be the freshest of bottles. There is some grass like qualities in the nose, like a wet grass kind of scent. It's more back end then anything else but to me, it's there. I'm ready to see if Hop Juice is worth it. Let's drink up! 

First thing I get is a somewhat subdued hop bitterness. It does a nice job of driving everything else through the palate though. Middle of the tongue is where you get hit with a heavy dose of IBUs. Sides of the palate you get that peach sweetness, mango and papaya. Back end of this you do get more bitterness, some fresh hop characteristics. Actually that's probably the wet grass sort of note I was picking up on the nose. There is some subtle bitter citrus lingering on the palate as well. The caramel-like sweetness is definitely present throughout. 

So overall, Hop Juice isn't bad... but I don't think it's really that great. This has a nice mouth feel, definitely on the thicker side of things. But it's not exactly balanced. I was hoping for more of a balanced DIPA and ended up with the stickier, syrupy sort of sweet DIPA. Again, it's not bad but I wouldn't really go out of my way to pick this up again. Certainly wouldn't turn it down if offered but it's one that otherwise I'd say is a pass. 

Rating: C+

Left Coast Brewing Co - Ale Epeteios

What's up everybody?!? It's Friday, no more work for the week and it's time to get some good drinking in. Decided to hit the local liquor store and pick up a few random beers for review purposes. Came across today's beer and figured, 'why not?'

Tonight I'm drinking Ale Epeteios from Left Coast Brewing in San Clemente, CA. This is a 9.5% Imperial Stout which also happens to be Left Coast's anniversary ale. According to the back of the bottle, Ale Epeteios means Anniversary Ale in Greek. So for the rest of this review, we're going to simply calls this Anniversary ale... or Greek Stout.

I've had a few Left Coast beers over the years and have enjoyed them all quite a bit so I'm genuinely looking forward to this beer.

Enough rambling though, it's time to pour the Greek Stout into a glass.

Greek Stout poured out a really dark black with a khaki, bordering on mocha/brown colored head. There was a 2-3 finger head that stuck around for a little bit but didn't leave much lacing. This beer is completely pitch black. No light coming through whatsoever. This is really what an Imperial Stout should look like. No light. Dark. Evil. Just perfect.

I don't know why I keep looking at it, I'm not going to see anything magically appear so let's get the nose on this beast. This beer smells very rich. A lot of dark chocolate just assaulting the nose....

(for fucks sake, I just spilled a splash of beer on my keyboard...)

Ok, crisis averted. Like I was saying, lots of dark chocolate. Definitely getting some of that alcohol coming through. It's masked well by the chocolate but it's definitely trying to sneak in through a window. The back of the bottle says this should also have coffee. Unfortunately, I'm not catching that on the nose at all. There's a nice chocolate cake kind of smell coming through as well. Reminds me a lot of a birthday cake from my childhood. Maybe the slightest, and I mean SLIGHTEST hint of coffee there but it's really hidden.

Greek Stout (as I've dubbed it), doesn't taste Greek at all. BIG Chocolate right away like the nose warned us about. I mean, really big dark chocolate. If I didn't know any better I'd think they melted a couple of Hershey's Special Dark and put them in each bottle. Really nice stuff. Middle of the mouth I'm getting a nice coffee/espresso bitterness. It's quality stuff. Not any bullshit instant shit either. We're talking premium roast. There's a bit of alcohol noticeable in the middle of the mouth as well. Back end there's a ton of espresso/coffee bitterness. Very earthy. I'm also getting a tobacco flavor that I haven't really experienced since my smoking days. I really enjoy it.

This beer is smooth, creamy and really solid. Honestly, you can't go wrong with much from Left Coast. Their beers are very affordable. I think I paid $5-$6 for this one and I'd happily pay $8 maybe even $9 for it.

Rating: A

Wife picked up some solid chocolate notes but a bit of alcohol as well. It tasted like beer for sure.