My friend Joe is in town this week for work, and this is his last night in town. We were looking for a good place to eat that also has some decent craft beers on tap. I got a reservation at Reality Bites, a nice restaurant in town that usually has 6 or so pretty good beers on tap. I was excited when I saw this beer on tap, because my friend Tom from our local homebrew club raved about it when he had it. Both Joe and I went for this black IPA.
Location: On tap and served in a snifter glass at Reality Bites in Bloomington, IL.
Numbers: 8.3% ABV, 80 IBUs, 45 SRM, ~260 Calories
Ingredients: Malts: Pale Malt, Malted Rye, Dash of Cara-Rye, Midnight Wheat from Briess, De-Bittered Black Malt (Weyermann – Germany/Patagonia malting – Chile); Hops: German Magnum (bittering), Citra & Amarillo (flavor/aroma and double dry-hopped)
Appearance & Aroma: It’s dark black in color, and I couldn’t see any light through it when I held it in front of the candle on the table. It had a thick, foamy, khaki colored head that had great retention and lacing. The aroma is a mix of roastiness and citrusy-piney hops.
Taste & Feel: The body is full and the mouthfeel is smooth and somewhat creamy from the big head on it. The flavor up front is a lightly sweet dark cocoa flavor with some piney hoppiness, which is joined by some citrusy hoppiness in the middle. In the finish, a citrusy-earthy-piney hop flavor and bitterness dominates, with some roasty and rye spicy bitterness in the background. The citrusy hop flavors lasted for a bit in the aftertaste with a bit of cocoa roastiness in the background.
Food Pairing: This beer has an interesting mix of roasty cocoa and citrusy-piney flavors. I think this would go nicely with barbacoa tacos, mixing the darker flavors with the pork and the hoppy flavors with the other taco toppings.
Overall Impression: I’m not usually a big fan of Cascadian Dark IPAs, or Black IPAs, as the roasty-bitter dark malts don’t usually mix well with the citrusy hops. However, this beer nailed the style. The roastiness was more of a cocoa flavor, and the earthy-piney hops mixed well with the citrusy ones to make for a smooth transition. I think the rye spiciness helped it as well. It almost reminded me of the chocolate oranges and other fruity chocolates enjoyed this time of year. Overall, this is the best dark IPA I’ve had and I can certain see why my friend Tom raved about it. I’m definitely going to have to get a bottle of this for home enjoyment.
My Rating: 
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