Brewdog Old World India Pale Ale

BrewDog is a post Punk apocalyptic mother fu*ker of a craft brewery. Well, at least that is how this Scottish brewery describes themselves. I have seen their beers here and there, but to this point have not tried one. Based on their self-praise, I am excited to taste the limited release Old World India Pale Ale and it better be good. This IPA is categorized as an English IPA which generally doesn’t pack as much punch, errr… hops, as the American IPA. This style of beer was developed, as I believe is fairly common knowledge, using a higher amount of hops than the traditional ales of the time in order to ship to British troops stationed in India. The hops are a natural preservative and therefore created a beer that did not spoil on the long boat ride half way across the world. English IPAs of today tend to have lower alcohol content and less hop character than those of the past. I have read it is related to avoiding higher taxes on the higher alcohol content, but I think it is because boat rides to India are faster these days. This particular beer is a throwback to the “Old World” version with 7.5% ABV. Brewdog made this to be sold exclusively in the United States, so maybe the higher ABV (and hopefully hoppiness) is an attempt to compete with their American counterparts. What ever the goals, I am excited to try my first Brewdog.

Beer me! I pour from the 22 ounce bottle into my glass to reveal a cloudy copper beer. The head is a caramel color and minimal. The smell is nowhere close to the hoppy American version where you can pick up the fragrance without sticking your face in the glass. I detect slight hops, bread, and citrus; however, none seem to jump out at me as a dominant scent. My first taste reveals so much more than I expected based on the smell. Hops are much more present in the taste along with toffee/candy, a nice amount of malt, and bitter finish. I actually expected it to be overly malty for my taste, but it really is quite balanced though slightly sweet. The mouth feel jumps out at me as silky smooth and very light with little carbonation. Overall I like this beer and would buy again, especially at a reasonable $5.99 (Total, Wine & Beverage) per 22 ounce bottle. Unfortunately this is a limited release, so you will have to snatch it up fairly quickly. Final grade on the Old World IPA is a 3.75 out of 5 mugs on the Draft Notes scale. I definitely look forward to trying a few more of the Brewdog offerings as this “Punk apocalyptic mother fu*ker of a craft brewery” are on to something.

For more information on Brewdog, you can visit their website: http://www.brewdog.com/. One last note, as you can see on the picture I have included the art work on the bottle is pretty cool. A little back ground and other work by the artist can be found here: http://www.johannabasford.com/blog-article/239