So much has been going on this weekend. First, I finally admitted it was time to replace the burner element on the grill, which is the hardest part of the whole procedure. Once you’ve bitten the bullet, scraping a few years worth of grease off of any screws you need to undo doesn’t seem quite as onerous.
Then I got to drop in on the Beer Garden at my local village fest, the Rotary Grove Fest at downtown Downers Grove. The arrangement was agreeable: no admission, since the beer garden was also the concert venue and had local food vendors. The craft beers were pouring from 1 to 4pm, and just $5 got you three samples in a generous 5 oz glass… in which most pourers ignored the serving line and went to the rim.
And I got out to another can release at a local brewer, this one Miskatonic Brewing Co., on the I-55 frontage road in Darien.
This is supposedly the weekend that the hot new style of “Brut IPA” drops, among many brewers in the Chicago area. Throw away those “milkshake” Northeast IPAs, get on the bandwagon for extremely dirty IPA beers. And for once, I’m getting to taste one as they come out.
Brut IPA originated in San Francisco, so SFGate claims, with Kim Sturdavant of Social Brewing and Kitchen. He decided, in 2016, to brew an India Pale Ale and add an amylase enzyme, which breaks down starches into fermentable surgars, creating more alcohol wile maintaining a lighter body.
In Miskatonic’s description: “Cryomancer is designed to be as bright and juicy as the hoppiest of NE IPA’s, but dry, bone dry. So dry, in fact, that it comes in negative when we measure the remaining sugars left after fermentation. Only a handful of breweries in the area have made this style and we’re happy to join their ranks.“
The pour is extremely light, like a lawnmower lager, but with a sort of juicy haze in it. There was a fizzy, foamy head that reached to the top of this tulip glass, but it fizzled out before I could take this picture. The scent has plenty of mango and them pine resin, so in that regard, it’s still very much an American style Pale Ale.
Taste
If I’m meant to think of this as “brut” as in very dry wine or champagne, I don’t think it’s quite there. There still a bit of malt sweetness to it, though, yes, less than one gets with a 7.0% abv brew. The can also lists it at 20 IBU, which seems much lighter than the bitterness I actually perceived. There’s mango and pine still on the tongue. The hop notes linger for a bitter aftertaste. It finishes quickly, leaving a noticeable coating of “legs” in the glass.
So begins my adventure into exploring a new style of “Brut IPA.” Obviously I need to try a few more for comparison’s sake, and report back.
