Tag Archives: Double IPA

Wet N Reckless Brewing

NOTE: Wet N Reckless has closed for some time because of a fire at the brewery. It is still unclear if they will open again later.

I had visited this brewery a few times before starting this blog but I wanted to make sure to wait until they had some stuff I enjoyed before writing an entry. Like many smaller breweries, the lineup changes pretty regularly and the beers are sometimes hit and miss. Wet N Reckless doesn’t bottle any of their beers for sale in the grocery store and they still use plastic cups for the tasters. If you want to have a glass to use to enjoy your pints, you have to buy one and put your name on it. Despite all that, when you find something you like there, it is usually quite good.

Wet N Reckless Inside.
Wet N Reckless Inside.

From the outside it is your typical small brewery in an industrial area. When you get close, the breweries signs help guide you to the parking lot. Otherwise you might miss it and wonder where you went wrong.

Wet N Reckless 03 Wet N Reckless 04

As you can see from the names, Wet N Reckless likes to use creative names for beers. The selection is broad and has something for everyone. Though I don’t appreciate some of the beers heavier on the malts, the honey badger, or the mead, these beers are what sets them apart from other breweries. If you like honey in your beer or are gluten intolerant, you might find something to love about some of the different brews here.

Wet N Reckless 05

I went with three tasters, the Floral Pleasure, Harmless Fun, and More Cowbell. Floral Pleasure is an interesting beer that is different from what you might expect. It is not an IPA and it isn’t an IPL. Instead, it is a beer with heavy floral hops on the front end. This is the closest beer you will find here to a traditional San Diego IPA. While they have an IPA, it is too malty for my tastes, so I prefer floral pleasure. The Harmless Fun has a nice wheat flavor but not enough hops for my tastes. It is described as a wheat beer dry-hopped with Citra hops. I don’t taste enough citra to give it the flavor that I would like to taste.

Pint of More Cowbell.
Pint of More Cowbell.

Then we are up to the most interesting beer of the night, the More Cowbell. Somehow I hadn’t tried this beer before today. I always love a good double IPA and this one was just what I liked to see. At first I was a bit unsure if I would like it but by the time I finished my taster I was ready to order a pint, and then another one. Made with exclusively with Summit hops, this is a grassy IPA and at times I was ready to call it too malty but I could taste enough hops in the beer that I was hooked. As I could tell, everyone else who was visiting knew exactly what they were getting and was back for more.

To show how addicting this beer is, there is a cowbell on the bar that has a sticker on it reading “More Cowbell” I was ready to ring it a few times though after two pints I was satisfied. I saw a number of people ordering multiple pints of this delicious beer while I was there. Clearly, I had missed something and I will be back to try some more. If you love your hops, make sure you keep an eye out for Floral Pleasure and More Cowbell. Follow Wet N Reckless on Facebook to make sure you get notified when the beers are available.

Paul McGuire

Paul McGuire is a craft beer enthusiast. He likes to travel with his husband and enjoy the great outdoors. In his day job, Paul is a divorce attorney serving clients in San Diego California.

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Iron Fist Brewing Company

I’ve had Iron Fist beers on tap at other places a few times but never made it up to the brewery itself.

Iron Fist Brewing.
Iron Fist Brewing.

Iron Fist had a large selection of beers on tap and a number of specialty brews. Since my husband doesn’t like most of the styles, I had to stick to the hop-heavy beers so I could taste what I like. Sometime I may come back to see what the Belgian styles taste like. To finish off my flight my husband got a taster of the stout on nitro.

Iron Fist tasting flight.
Iron Fist tasting flight.

The pale ale was a bit disappointing after Stone’s Lavender Pale Ale earlier in the day. It was too light for my tastes. There was no regular IPA available to try so I went straight into the Double IPA. I had three versions of the Gauntlet Double IPA, the regular, one dry-hopped with citra hops, and one with coffee. The regular Gauntlet was a bit too heavy on the darker fruits and pine for my tastes. It seemed like the malts overpowered the hops a little too much.

Iron Fist 02

 

Next I tried the double IPA with citra hops. This was closer to what I tend to like in San Diego double IPAs. The citra hop flavor comes out nice and strong in front of everything else and has a nice flavor. The coffee double IPA was pretty much like drinking an iced coffee. Despite the strong flavor of the double IPA the coffee was all I really tasted. It was quite nice.

To finish things off, I tried a special version of the stout with ghost peppers and vanilla beans. I was really impressed by this one because it had a delicious sweet vanilla flavor at the front and some spicy kick at the back. It was spicy but not particularly so, and not as hot as the Habanero Sculpin some might be familiar with. If you don’t like sweet though, you should stay away from this one because it almost tastes like chocolate chip cookie dough iced cream at the front end.

I would have liked to have an option for a middle of the road IPA here. I probably won’t be buying the Gauntlet anytime soon on tap other places because of the heavy malt flavor but I would really like more of the Gauntlet with citra hops.

Paul McGuire

Paul McGuire is a craft beer enthusiast. He likes to travel with his husband and enjoy the great outdoors. In his day job, Paul is a divorce attorney serving clients in San Diego California.

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Modern Times Brewing, Hoppy Beers for Hop Heads

I’m going to try to eventually hit all the breweries out of my area but as you can understand with so many good breweries so close together it is hard to find motivation to make it down to other breweries. Today I went to Modern Times and Acoustic Aleworks because they are so close together. At first I wasn’t sure that I was in the right place even though I knew I had followed the directions exactly. Like many breweries, Modern Times doesn’t have much fancy signage outside. You might walk right past it if it isn’t very busy. Thankfully it is right behind a few nude bars that you see every time you drive down Rosecrans. The parking could be better but considering the area it isn’t surprising.

View of the brewery from outside.
View of the brewery from outside.

Thankfully, the brewery looks much better inside. As soon as you step foot in the door you can feel the unique vibe of the place that comes from the stacks of books under the bar, the comic books on the wall to the left, the 8-bit-inspired art on the wall to the right, and other unique decorations all around. It is unlike any other brewery I have ever visited. If it wasn’t for the few tables near the larger window in the wall it would be as dark as a speak-easy.

Wall of comic-books.
Wall of comic-books.
8-bit-inspired artwork on the wall.
8-bit-inspired artwork on the wall.

The brewery has a fairly small selection compared to some of the places I frequent, but it isn’t hurt by it. The four mainstays offer enough variety that most people should find something to enjoy and they had two seasonal offerings that rounded out the selection nicely. Though they did give me a discount because of my blog I did not learn of this until after I had already written about the beers. It was also small enough that it wouldn’t influence my writings.

I started things off with a flight of four tasters. Though the offerings at first seem typical, I can assure you they are not. They have a saison, a hoppy amber, a hoppy wheat bear, and a coffee stout. The saison is the only one that is what you might expect. I’m not typically a fan of saison beers so I can’t say if it was a good or bad one but it was more drinkable than some I have had elsewhere.

Taster flight. Saison (top left), Hoppy Amber (top right), Hoppy Wheat (bottom left), Coffee Stout (bottom right)
Taster flight. Saison (top left), Hoppy Amber (top right), Hoppy Wheat (bottom left), Coffee Stout (bottom right)
Modern Times tap list as of December 28, 2013
Modern Times tap list as of December 28, 2013

I quite enjoyed both the hoppy wheat and hoppy amber. The hoppy wheat reminded me most of a session IPA or an extra pale ale. It had a nice hop flavor up front and a mellow flavor with the lighter alcohol. This might be a good way to introduce your friends to hops. The hoppy amber most closely resembled a San Diego IPA with the up-front Nelson hop flavors. Nelson hops deliver the familiar grapefruit taste and it was quite prominent here. I left with a four-pack of 16oz cans of the hoppy amber because it was my favorite of the night. To round off the flight, we had some coffee stout, which was a nice lighter alcohol stout. Flavor wise, it was on the bitter side and was close to having a cup of iced coffee. This is not for people who prefer sweeter stouts.

Books stacked up under the bar.
Books stacked up under the bar.

I also tried the IPA, made with bread yeast, and the double IPA before I left. I wasn’t very big on the flavors of the IPA. I tasted a light bitter flavor at the front with a little pineapple behind it. The double IPA was quite drinkable but a bit too heavy on the pine/resin flavors for my tastes. It certainly is well balanced but I prefer double IPAs with more citrus flavors.

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Modern Times is one of the first San Diego breweries to offer to fill blank growlers and sell their own growler-cozies that you can slip onto a growler from any other brewery. Eventually we should see both of these become standard but for now they are the first that I am aware of. If you like San Diego IPAs, it is worth stopping by Modern Times for some of the Blazing World hoppy amber. Look for the Blazing World in stores as well and be sure to grab some.

Paul McGuire

Paul McGuire is a craft beer enthusiast. He likes to travel with his husband and enjoy the great outdoors. In his day job, Paul is a divorce attorney serving clients in San Diego California.

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Craft Beer Lover’s Wedding

Tomorrow (December 20, 2013) I will be getting married to a man. My husband was a bit slow to come around to enjoying craft beer but now enjoys a good stout and porter. If it had been up to me, the reception would be just beer, but he and others convinced me to have some snacking food. Though my selections aren’t perfect I had to keep in mind the varying tastes of my guests because not all of them love the bitter sting of an IPA. So I thought I’d share with everyone the beers I chose for the wedding.

Wedding Beer
Wedding Beer

San Diego beer drinkers will recognize that most of the beer here is from San Diego breweries. First off, two ballast point brewer’s selections. These multi-packs first became available this year and help satisfy guests who like a good pale ale and amber while including one of San Diego’s top IPAs, the Sculpin. Big Eye IPA is also solid and rounds out the pack. From Stone, another San Diego Brewery, I have six 22oz bottles of the 2013 Vanilla Bean Smoked Porter. This is for my husband and anyone else who prefers a good porter. Those same people might also appreciate the Full Suit Belgian Brown from Karl Strauss, one of the bigger San Diego breweries. Also from Karl Strauss is their Tower 10 IPA, a favorite of mine that looks like it was freshly released. To top it all off, I have two (though only one pictured here) of the delightful New Belgium Folly Pack 2013 (as I reviewed in my earlier post). This set is nice because it has some lighter seasonal brews and some IPA and even a Double IPA (the strongest beer of the night).

This gives us a total of 108 12oz bottles of beer and 6 22oz bottles of beer. Assuming 30 out of our 40 guests drink beer, that is about 3 or 4 drinks per person.

[NOTE: I purposefully did not get a bunch of Green Bullet or other beers over 9% because I want to be able to enjoy myself without going overboard. I also purposefully did not buy a bunch of growlers or a keg. It is better to have a variety than to assume that everyone will love my favorite IPA.

If you happen to notice that the boxes are empty, you are correct. The beers are all chilling in the fridge so I don’t have to put them on ice.]

What beers would you have at your wedding? 

Paul McGuire

Paul McGuire is a craft beer enthusiast. He likes to travel with his husband and enjoy the great outdoors. In his day job, Paul is a divorce attorney serving clients in San Diego California.

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New Belgium Folly Pack 2013 with Double IPA

Breweries love releasing different selections of beers depending on the season as if I change what I drink based on the season. Some would suggest that IPAs are summer beers although thankfully IPAs have been showing up in winter selections lately. For a few years I have been looking forward to each new selection of winter beers from New Belgium for a few reasons. One, I tend to buy so many IPAs I never have anything around to drink that is lighter in alcohol. Two, they brew some great beers and I usually enjoy most of the selections. Though I am a bit disappointed that the Belgium IPA is not included anymore this year, the new double IPA more than makes up for it. This is primarily a review of the double IPA although I will also briefly review some of the other inclusions. 

New Belgium Rampant Double IPA.
New Belgium Rampant Double IPA.
Though a bit on the darker side this doesn’t have the insane malt flavors that plague many of the imperials. It has a nice mix of peach and floral flavors. At 8.5% it is the right amount of alcohol to satisfy the hop craving without knocking you out. This beer comes with some of their IPA, Belgium Red, winter lager, and fat tire. Each of the beers has a unique taste, unlike some Sam Adams boxes where you might have a hard time telling one beer from another. It is understandable that you have to buy some of the lighter beers to get the IPAs because the IPAs are so expensive to produce. The winter ale and fat tire are both tasty for what they are. If you can find the Folly Pack in stores for around $12 for a 12pack, do yourself a favor and pick one up. 

 

Paul McGuire

Paul McGuire is a craft beer enthusiast. He likes to travel with his husband and enjoy the great outdoors. In his day job, Paul is a divorce attorney serving clients in San Diego California.

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