Blue Mountain Full Nelson Pale Ale

Brewed by Blue Mountain Brewery
Style: India Pale Ale (IPA)
Afton, Virginia USA

60 IBU!!!! Bottle from Vintage Cellar. Amber color with a decent white head. Aromas of lightly roasted caramel, florality and fruitiness. Near medium body with creamy carbonation. Flavor is roast malt with resin, floral and fruit hop. The bitter seems to come from roasted malt as much as from hop. It’s nicely bitter, and finishes arguably balanced. It’s tasty, and I wouldn’t turn down another. Fresh hoppiness with each mouthful.

Courtesy of Juart. Pours a clear amber color with some red-orange hues. A thick foamy beige head that leaves a decent amount of lacing. Aroma is citrus and floral. Very sweet. The taste has a lot of spicy bitter flavors up front. A resiny hop taste with a citrus bitter that lingers on the back of the tongue. Some dirty caramel flavors in the background. The texture is sort of creamy because of the carbonation, but I don’t feel it fits well with the flavor. Lacks a little bit of balance.

RBSG ’08: Poured a clear gold color with a white head. Light citrus and caramel aroma and flavor. Not much complexity or big flavors going on.

Draft. Clear, deep amber with an off white head. Nice piney nose, grapefruit and caramel. Resinous pine flavors, nice grapefruit rind bite. A good brew.

on tap-pours a rich off white head and amber color. Aroma is citrus/pine, some medium malt. Taste is citrus/pine/earthy hops-some bitter, secondary medium malt-caramel. Medium body. Soft carbonation.

Pours a clear golden amber with a short-lived off-white head that faded to a collar quickly leaving a bit of lacing. Aroma is heavy on roasted malts compared to most pales and has some earthy hop tones as well. The taste has a much bigger hop profile than the aroma and starts off with a pine hop bitterness that lingers throughout. There is a strong caramel malt presence in the middle before the hops hit the palate again in the finish. The bitterness holds the drinkability back a bit, but I enjoyed this one and look forward to other brews from Blue Mountain.

(bottle) Rich amber body and a medium sized, rocky off-white head. The aroma is fresh, floral hops, and sweet sugar and malt. Medium bodied, and somewhere between a creamy and oily mouthfeel. The flavor has lots of fresh hops, but with a bit of sweetness up front that balances it out to maintain a refreshing feel. The finish is more bitter. I was very pleasantly surprised by this beer from just down the road.

THOUGHTS: The first Virginia beer I ever tried. It was pretty good. A slight saltiness was a different spin on an IPA. TECHNICAL: On tap at the Mellow Mushroom in Charlottesville, VA. Was a medium copper with a small, off-white head that mostly diminished but left fair lacing. The aroma was some caramel malt and citrus hops and maybe some pine. A little weak though. The flavor had a nice balance between malty start and grapefruit hoppy finish. The malt up from was a little salty when it warmed. The finish had a long duration. The medium body was fizzy with a light astringent finish.