Great Lakes Lake Erie Monster
Was pleased to get hooked up with a few bottles of this down in Columbus from Jaimie at From the Vine. It proved surprisingly hard to track these down even in Ohio, so I was excited to give it a try. Appearance- Pours a deep shade of translucent orange amber into my snifter. I only get about a finger of slightly orange-ish head off of a fairly aggressive pour though, and it dies back in short order to some thin patches across the top. Some beading carbonation in the body of the beer but no real lacing. Smell- A nice nose of both fruity and piney hop resin. To me, it smells heavily of orange preserves or marmalade, followed thereafter by a pretty strong dose of pine needle. Some sweet malt seems evident on the finish as well. Taste- The orange marmalade flavors start off the show and to me taste very much like fresh orange preserves. This is followed up with some very bitter pine needle that finishes on a somewhat aspirin-like note as the beer goes down. As the beer warmed, it became somewhat sweeter with a bit more of the sweet caramel flavors from the malt showing through. That being said, it remained quite bitter and hop dominated. Mouthfeel/Drinkability- Mouthfeel was solid, slick, and well carbonated and for 9.1%, the beer went down quite easily. Could probably have had a second one in the sitting but definitely would have felt it after. Overall, a very solid DIPA and definitely noticeable as the big brother of Commodore Perry. I liked it but was not blown away. Thought it was a solid offering that I would have again if readily available but probably won't go far out of the way to get it.