248. Stone – Ruination IPA India Pale Ale

Posted By kkozlen on Dec 28, 2010 | 0 comments

As I mentioned a few months back, a friend of mine sent me several Stone beers from San Diego.  I’ve really been looking forward to these, but unfortunately, they got caught in the back of the beer fridge, so I thought it was time to break them out.  I won’t list what the entire back of the bottle says (I posted it in the photo below), but here’s a little piece, “Stone Ruination IPA. So called because of the immediate ruinous effect on your palate… 100+ IBU’s. 7.7% ABV.”  For those not familiar with IBU’s, that’s International Bitterness Units, and the human tongue can supposedly only sense up to 100 (even though there are beers that exceed this, such as Lucky Labrador’s Summit IPA and Terminal Gravity’s Single Hop Double IPA).

This was orange in color and was slightly hazy.  The head was creamy at first, turning to a soapy foam, causing nice lacing on the glass.  The aroma was nice and piney and citrusy.

For a medium-sized beer, at 7.7% ABV, the body was fairly light, with a crisp mouthfeel.  After an initial hop bitterness, there was a smooth
honey-citrusy hop flavor in the middle.  What quickly followed was a big citrusy, slightly piney, hop flavor in the finish.  The aftertaste is where the hop flavor really kicks in, almost making my mouth clench
from the citrusy bitterness.

A food pairing is difficult with this one.  However, I think I’d recommend having a warm pretzel with this beer.  The pretzel would help to cleanse, maybe I should say relieve, the palate between drinks, allowing you to experience the big hop flavor over and over again, while cutting down on the tensing bitterness of the aftertaste.

After the Oregon Brewers Festival, and experiencing other 100 IBU beers (like Beer Valley Brewing – Leafer Madness Imperial Pale Ale and Alpha Centauri Binary IPA) I was a little nervous because of the need to back up the big hop bitterness with a strong malt backbone.  This one definitely delivered a big hop flavor, but also one that was a great flavor.  If you’re a hophead, I definitely recommend this one.

My Rating:

Reader Ratings[five-star-rating]