COUNTRY OF ORIGIN: USA (Perkasie, PA!)
BREWERY: Free Will Brewing Company
STYLE: IPA
ABV: 6.6%
PURCHASE: Draft (pint), $6.00
SERVING: Chilled pint glass. Perfect 3/4-inch high crown. Much better than average retention.
APPEARANCE: Beautiful light-gold body with a spongy white head. A little translucent. Not a lot of visible bubbling. Excellent lacing.
AROMA: Hops (surprise, surprise) with citrus notes of grapefruit and lemon rind. Possible tease of orange, possible tease of caramel (likely a placebo effect at work). Hint of malt and grain. Floral.
TASTE: One of the smoothest IPAs I've had in a while. Medium body that leans slightly in the direction of heavy. Carbonation is initially mellow and only becomes sharp if held unusually long. Avoids the typical IPA trap of too much hoppiness. Nice crescendo of both hops and citrus notes, with the citrus--again, primarily grapefruit and lemon--carrying the aftertaste. Not overly complex, but very well balanced.
MUSINGS AND METAPHORS: Sometimes there's strength in simplicity. This brew doesn't try to do a whole lot. But what it does, it does well.
What I really liked about this IPA is not only that it didn't over-rely on hops, but it also didn't have what I call that "artificial sweetener" quality in the aftertaste that so many others seem to have these days. It's what separates the great IPAs from the rest of the pack.
Free Will Brewing, from Perkasie, Pennsylvania, in upper central Bucks County, brews 13--yes, 13--IPAs, comprising almost half their entire lineup. They have a tap room in the popular outdoor shopping center known as Peddler's Village, in Lahaska, which is roughly 15 miles to the east, and only a few miles west of the Delaware River. If you're in the area, I highly recommend checking it out.
GRADE: A-
COUNTRY OF ORIGIN: USA (Yardley, PA!)
BREWERY: Vault Brewing Company
STYLE: IPA
ABV: 6.4%
PURCHASE: Draft (12 oz.), $7.00
SERVING: Footed gibraltar glass. Perfect one-inch head from the tap with very good retention.
APPEARANCE: Very nice, golden yellow-orange body takes on a "sunrise/sunset" kind of appearance. Bright white, densely packed crown. Visually speaking, could pass for a witbier or hefeweizen. Not much in the way of visible bubbling, and on the first go-round, not much lacing. That changed next beer; must have been an issue with the "beer-cleanliness" of the glassware. (Google it.)
AROMA: Hoppy (no shit). But also has prominent notes of caramel and citrus, particularly in the form of grapefruit. Orange and lemon zest seems to sneak in there, as well as some other fruit--my guess is mango. A little bready as well.
TASTE: Hoppy (no shit). But also has prominent notes of caramel and citrus, particularly in the form of grapefruit. Some other fruit seems to factor into the taste profile, seems to be melon or mango, possibly orange. Moderately carbonated with a relatively light mouthfeel for an over-6% brew. A little yeasty. The one major downfall here is a stubborn, artificial sweetener quality that seems to crescendo at the back and linger in the aftertaste.
MUSINGS AND METAPHORS: Multidimensional for an IPA, and that's a positive. A lot of IPAs fall into the trap of being hoppy and pretty much nothing else. This one strives for more, and just about gets there.
So why is it called "CCCCC?" Or, "5Cs," for short? Because of the five varieties of hops used in the brewing process for this beer, all of which begin with, you guessed it, the letter C: Cascade, Centennial, Columbus, Chinook, and Citra.
They couldn't use just four. "CCCC" already belongs to a community college somewhere, I'd bet. And "4Cs" is too close to 4C (potential lawsuit).
GRADE: B+
