Stone Enjoy By 04.20.14 IPA

Brewed By: Stone Brewing Co. in Escondido, California

Purchased: 22oz bomber bought at Sheridan 'L' Longue in Chicago, IL; 2014

Style/ABV: Imperial IPA, 9.4% 
Reported IBUs: 102

"Devastatingly dank." Or, 420 flame the bundle, baguette. 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. Also...farking woot and fizzy yellow beer is for bitches. 

I've previously dabbled with Stone's Enjoy By series, and needless to say, I'm quite the fan. With that said, today is 4/20, so it seemed like an appropriate time to crack into one of these big, dank, hoppy, Imperial IPAs.

Stone Enjoy By 04.20.14 IPA

In appropriate 420 fashion, this one pours into a flaming orange body. The body is semi hazy like your room after several bong hits, and there are carbonation bubbles rising upwards with sweet bubbly action. This one kicks up two fingers of sticky, hop-fueled head, and there are golden-orange tones everywhere: in the body, the head, and the holy spirit wutttt. Bright light confirms the same stuff, and the lacing is griping on tighter than a stoned teenager hanging on to the armrest during a routine speeding stop. This is the West Coast look that Sam Adams was trying to go for, I think.

The aroma here is dank as hell. There's huge pine, citrus, resin, hemp, and that smell you can only get if you sniff a hippy's jacket or go to a Grateful Dead concert. There's a really nice grassy character on the aroma, flirting with straight up lawnmower trimmings to legit hemp and weed, with tons of underlying resinous citrus, a little caramel sweetness, and a kiss of malty cracker/biscuit. Again, this is what I envision when I dream about West Coast IPAs.

This is a blissfully straightforward West Coast Imperial IPA, and I mean that in a good way. There's tons of resinous, dank, hoppy goodness in the taste...I'm getting big guava, apricot, orange, kumquats, pine, grass, hemp, seedy hemp, weed, lawn trimmings, and some resinous and bitter grapefruit. There's a little push of bitter grapefruit rind and woody resin, and lots of underlying caramel sweetness. There's a touch of biscuity/cracker malt, but this is a hop bomb through and through.

At 9.4%, this is super quaffable. This is a medium-bodied, refreshing beer. Yeah, it's dank and boozy and big, but the bitterness is offset by nice sweetness and the huge West Coast hops provide much needed drinkability. Palate depth is spot on for the style, and complexity is good. It's a great take on the West Coast double-IPA, but nothing too far out of the ordinary. Just a good beer, best consumed fresh. Up front: Lots of sweet hops, citrus, marmalade, caramel sugars; the mids hit grassy notes, more sweet hops, huge dank hemp; the back end starts to dial up some resinous bitterness and grapefruit rind, and you get kisses of cracker/biscuit. This is fantastic and pretty much defines Stone.

Rating: Above-Average (4.0/5.0 Untappd)

This is a very Strong Above-Average. I really like this series, and I would not hesitate to recommend this or pick up another Enjoy By. These beers are great, and they pair well with American bar food, spicy Mexican food, wings, grilled meats, and anything that an Imperial IPA can go against. I'm a fan of this series, and I think this is one of Stone's better gimmicks. 

Random Thought: Nothing celebrates the resurrection of J-C like 420 blazin' it.