Stone India Pale Ale (IPA)

Brewed By: Stone Brewing Co. in Escondido, California

Purchased: Single 12oz bottle from Jewel-Osco from Chicago, Illinois; 2012

Style/ABV: India Pale Ale, 6.9% 

Stone's IPA may just be the definitive "extreme" West Coast IPA. I've had this beer before, along with a bunch of other Stone beers that I have not quite wrapped my brain around yet in a review. There's very little to complain about with respect to this beer. But before I dive in, let me throw down some quick info about Stone:

Stone Brewing are one of the more prominent breweries in the American craft brewing scene. They were founded in 1996 in San Marcos, California, and moved to Escondido, California where they recently expanded their operations. Stone was founded by Steve Wagner and Greg Koch. Koch has a reputation among the craft beer community for voicing his opinion, not putting up with shit, and standing behind his beer.

Stone's India Pale Ale was first released back in 1997. So this is a brewery staple, a West Coast staple, and one of the most recognized and acclaimed American IPAs. This beer is brewed with Columbus (pungent aroma), Chinook (medium-heavy, spicy, piney, and grapefruit), and Centennial (floral and citrus) hops. This beer clocks in at a pretty mean 6.9% ABV, and packs a solid 77 IBUs. Word on the street is that this beer is dry-hopped for 2 weeks as well, so you can expect lots of hop aromas and hop flavors in this beer. Everybody who reviews beer has already reviewed this beer, so let's cut to the chase and dive in. 

Stone India Pale Ale (IPA)

The beer pours with 3-fingers of white/slightly off-white head. The head has thick bubbles that have a dish soap bubble consistency. The body of this beer is a yellow/gold color, with hints of orange or copper. The beer is slightly hazy and has solid carbonation. As the head dissolves there is nice lacing on the glass, and head retention seems to be pretty good. The bottle is also very nice, as with all Stone Bottles.

The aroma on this is big hops, and you can definitely tell that this has been dry hopped for a while. There is also a hint of bready or malty undertone. I'm pulling out a lot of grapefruit, pine, orange rind, a touch of sweet malt which lends itself to some tropical fruits, and definitely some earthy/floral/pine hope notes. You do pull out a bit of that pungent and dank orange. 

The taste is a good reflection of the smell, with a lot of big herbal, earthy, and spicy hop notes. I'm even picking up a hint of mint! There are also a lot of big citrus notes in here, and this beer packs a pungent kick when you taste the 77 IBUs. There is a nice malt wave that kicks in, which really helps ground this beer and add some complexity. I'm tasting pine, earth, herbal, tea, orange rind, grapefruit, pungent orange on the back, and some sweet malt. This is creamy and smooth but has the undeniable sweetness and thickness associated with the big American IPAs. 

This isn't a clean beer per se, but it has a lot of tingly carbonation and a pretty smooth body. This is medium-full, drinkable for a 6.9% ABV IPA, and finishes with a wonderfully pungent and dry finish. There is alcohol warming on the back end which is nice too. This has great palate depth and big complexity. You get carbonation, hops, malt, and earthy hops on the front; this rolls into more earthy hops and spicy hops (mint, baby!); and the back ends with some pungent citrus kick. This really develops nicely across the palate, and the finish is spectacular. 

Rating: Divine Brew 

Score: 91%

I feel like I have been handing out "Divine Brew" ratings like candy these days. The obvious reason it appears that way is because this blog is clearly biased: I'm drinking a lot of acclaimed and accomplished beer. I feel pretty grounded though, and the Stone IPA is definitely worthy of Divine Brew status. This weekend I enjoyed Dundee's IPA (which is a below-average brew that doesn't capture anything right about the style) and Goose Island's IPA (an average to above average brew). So it's not like I'm out of touch when it comes to scoring IPAs. 

Anyway...this is a very accomplished brew with big hop notes that have a lot of complexity and balance. Add in the fact that this beer is drinkable, available, and cheap, and you have a winner that you can and should stock in your fridge year-round. I find that Stone is often my go-to beer for random Friday or Saturday nights. I like to pick up a Stone bomber. And when I want to get my palate blasted with my hops, I know that Stone will always deliver. So there's that. This is a really good beer and definitely one of the definitive American IPAs. If you want to get into IPAs, you owe it to yourself to check this beer out.