Northern Hemisphere Harvest Wet Hop Ale
I'm not sure what I was expecting, but it wasn't this. It's not bad, but, well, it's not all that good either. Maybe it was too young. Maybe I'll let my second bottle age a year or two. Pours clear amber with a fluffy decent head and a little bit of carbonation from the glass. The aroma is sharp and hoppy, but strangely soapy. The flavor is sharp and bitter, but not pleasant - I find it spicy, astringent, with a strange soapy character that I have only encountered a few times in my life with hops. It reminds me of chewing on a piece of Orange zest. And it's strangely thin - there is plenty of hop flavor here, to be sure, but it is strange and unpleasant and lacking in solid malt balance. The mouthfeel is at once thin and clingy, leaving a lingering spicy bitterness on the tongue and the top of the mouth. Overall, the effect is just not what I'd want from a special Sierra Nevada product. I know I am in the minority, but this ranks as a major disappointment for me.