Moylans Hopsickle Imperial India Pale Ale

Brewed by Moylans Brewery & Restaurant
Style: Imperial/Double IPA
Novato, California USA

Bottle@LCRBM08. The aroma is hoppy with a lots of fruitiness (aprikot). Hazy, orange coloured with an off-white head. The taste is heavy hoppy with citrus and aprikots. Bit one-dimensional. Nice one for the hopheads.

Sampled at the Odds and Ends Tasting II on 10/19/07: Pours a dark copper color with a medium thick and fluffy off-white head that has good retention. Patchwork lacing on the glass. Strong hops nose that is citrusy and piney. Rich and bitter character with a citrusy hops punch and a solid toasted malt base. Some pine and alcohol are evident in the taste too. The finish is hoppy and leaves a lingering bitter aftertaste. Overall this beer is a great example of a straightforward IIPA that retains enough balance to make it supremely drinkable.

<b>In short: </b>A big-body heavy IIPA well balanced by a lot of fruity and resinous hops. Very good.
<b>How: </b>Bottle 22oz, drank relatively fresh a month or two after purchase
<b>The look: </b>Cloudy dark-orange topped by a medium off-white head with average retention
<b>In long: </b>Big nose of fruits and strong caramel. This is no a bottle of refreshing hop-juice refreshing. A ton of sweet caramelized malts, taste of sweet crusty sugar pie. This one has a big, very big body. Very sweet but thankfully also comes with a ton of hops and the end-result is rather well balanced. Hops bring fruity notes to lighten the beer but also have a strong resinous character. The body is big and heavy that this beer could almost pass as a ultra-hoppy barley wine. Not the most refreshing IIPA around but certainly a very nourishing one. Very tasty. Funny how a word like Hopsickle can conjure a totally different but equally enticing image to a child and a mature beer-geek. Just like the word pussy.

Wildly hoppy nose, opaque orange, tiny custard head. Full on west coast hops flavour. Full bodied, hoppy, bitter as can be. Terrific! Thanks HogTownHarry!

From the 22oz bottle. Pours a slightly cloudy dark amber with a white head. Wow this was seriously liquid hops, massive fresh hop taste, very green tasting and very crisp. Citrus hops throughout with a small amount of grapefruitiness in the finish. Probably one of the hoppiest beers i’ve had, very potent.

22. Damn. Not sure if the name is in reference to ice cream cones or something on the order of hammer and sickle, but anyway. Huge orange nose, almost candied; buttered, even. Borderline worried about diacetyl, so buttery. Definitely one of a kind in my humble experience. Big forward attack, mostly due to tingly carb and super aggressive flavors (the body’s within the bounds of normalcy). The finish has tons of grapefruit and pine, and it really hangs around. The mid-palate is just a pause between the nose and the finish, as with so many DIPAs; there’s a whisper of caramel there to remind you that there’s cereal as well as leaf involved in the brewing. But sit back and enjoy the hops--they’re the stars of the show, and the opening act (barley) barely gets to finish one tune.

Aroma is grapefruit, pine, citrus, and a little earth. Appearance is a cloudy copper IPA color. Flavor is a blast of hops. All of the aromas make their appearance as flavors. There is little malt backbone to speak of as the beer is unbalanced toward the hop side (not necessarilly a bad thing). The beer is heavy on the palate, as the hop resins are almost chewy. For some reason I seem to remember this being more harshly bitter, but even though it wasnt the taste bud assault that I expected, it is a hop lovers dream.

Hazy orange with a creamy, lasting head. Incredible mouthfeel. Juicy, vibrant, bold and charismatic hops were full of citrus, resinous pine, spruce and sharp grass. Bold bitterness was held in check by a rather solid and tasty malt backbone, which was rich with cocoa, caramel and chocolate malt balls. Plant-like twang lingered on the tongue. Fantastic beer, especially for a hophead like me.