Pizza Port Hop 15

Brewed by Port Brewing/Lost Abbey
Style: Imperial/Double IPA
San Marcos, California USA

Sampled at the Tosa tasting. Aroma: massive grapefruit hoppiness, fresh oranges. Appearance: copper color, thick milky frothy offwhite head. EXCELLENT lacing. Decent carbonation. Flavor: Oranges, sweet maltiness, grapefruit. Palate: Sweet. Light stickiness. Good carbonation. Hand bottle: #204. Overall: This is a MUST try.

Draft at Solana Beach. Enjoyed in the company of Buck Dich and DarkElf and friends. Tried this on cask and on tap. Much prefered the tap. The cask was much smoother as expected, but it really toned down the hop flavors. Aromas were very citrusy hoppy. Sweetness in there too. Flavors were great as well with a lot of hops in there as well. Talk about a hop bomb. Great stuff.

Couleur cuivrée tirant vers le brun aux reflets rougeâtres. Énorme mousse crémeuse adhérant bien à la paroi du verre. Une puissante explosion de saveur s’offre à nous. Une symphonie de houblon joue en tandem avec un concertos de malt sucré…Résines de houblons, écorce d’orange et conifères débordant de sève sont en avant-plan et offrent les parfait accords de soutient aux saveurs de gâteaux à la vanille, de sucre à la crème, de toffee et de raisins caramélisés…puis arrive le mordant d’alcool finale. Tout est tellement intense et puissant, c’est comme mettre l’amplificateur Marshall des saveurs à 11. Texture en bouche tout simplement parfaite, crémeuse et veloutée, carbonatation offrant le parfait support du début à la fin. A la fois une référence en terme de double IPA ainsi qu’une création des plus originale.

(Bottle, thanks, thanks THANKS WeeheavySD) Pours hop hazy copper amber. Nice off white head. Fantastic and complex hop aroma with a stable and sweet malt backbone. Sweet tones of toast, cookie, flowers, canned tomatoes, apricot, tangerine, mango and starfruit. Bitter tones of grapefruit, resiny pine, oily grass, black currant, wood and herbs. Creamy and full on the nose. Fruity and extremely hoppy flavour with a fat but clean toast backbone. Grapefruit, orange peel, resin and bitter herbs. More subtle tropical fruits. Light to medium sweet. Near full bitterness. Round, soft, velvety and smooth mouthfeel. Lingering afterbitterness with a fruity sting. Medium to full bodied. Fantastic and complex, this is a reminder of why IIPA is our favourite style.

9/4/9/5/18 - Bottle from Capone’s (also just got a pair from Naven - thanks!!!) Nice golden color with a small-medium head. Aroma is an incredible bouquet of freshly cut piney-citrus hops. Lots of sweetness coming through my nasal passages. Flavor is a sweet mix of citrusy-piney-floral hops with just enough malt to make it all OK. Emphasis is on the hops - this one finishes nice with great mouthfeel. This guy is really what DIPAs should strive to be.

Bottle. Hoppy, alcohol-pine aroma. Golden and clear. Good sting and lots of grapefruit and pine taste. Clean palate with lasting sting. Best at 55-60 degrees. [tasted next to a Dreadnaught] (not suprisingly) the Dreadnught’s peachy, the Hop-15 is piney, and both are superb.

On tap at Stone; one of the better beers I had there. Flavor was nice and hoppy, with some complexity and had nice flavor of citrus and pine, with some nice caramel balance. The hops are definitely the star of the show. Found it at least as good as Pliny the Elder. (Re-rated from a bottle. Smell was fantastic, better than I remembered and maybe the best aroma of any beer I have had; grapefruit and citrus with a candy/brown sugar vibe to it. Hops were as assertive as I remember. Just a fantastic beer. Bumped it up a bit).

We found this very similar to OG’s "Hop Juice".....but with MUCH better taste and masking of the super high alcohol content. Found a bomber on the shelf at my local BevMo