Unearthly (Imperial India Pale Ale) - Southern Tier Brewing Company

hustlesworth

Ohio

4.68/5  rDev +14.1%
look: 5 | smell: 5 | taste: 4.5 | feel: 5 | overall: 4.5

A- awesome hazy unfiltered looking apricot orange. This one looks beautiful in the tall, gracefully shaped stone levitation silver rimmed tulip. The foam is remarkable. It has the color and texture of whipped butter (like if you put cream in a jar and shake it) and the lace is just shoooo all over the place all drippy and sticky and whatnot. Haven't seen anything finer and this review is bound to be full of extraterrestrial and supernatural metaphors.

S- this one has the ideal nose to suit my standard for a DIPA. It's got that stellar marshmallow toffee wonderbong, baby!!!! Run through goldings in the hop back? Whaaaat?!?! Usually can't go wrong with 3 of the C's IMO and the nose is full of unexpected creamy fruits and berries like melon and strawberry with undertones of sweet pipe tobacco, vanilla, cedar, mushroom and cured hardwood. When cold, the hops really only come through in a lemony orange dish soap kinda way but as the beer warms just a bit watch out.. Grapefruit, peach, pear, mango, passion fruit, tropical outer space madness-- but not at all harsh and nostril ripping. Fermented tartness like full sour dills with a coriander spice note add another sprightly layer to what is already an amazing aroma.

T- so as my beard nears the lip of the glass and my lips protrude toward it, I begin to feel some apprehension, as if this beer will be so hoppy that it will slaughter me, leave me on the floor twitching in ghastly agony, aware of my former existence but unable to return to it. So I take a small sip and feel the sting. Just a precursor, I say to myself, just like licking the cut half of a scotch bonnet just to see what you're in for. Then a full and hearty draught. This is actually quite tame! And balanced! And, at first maybe even a little too sweet! My dog, laying at my feet raises her almond eyes to me and then adjusts her position into a big curled up ball, as if a cold wind had suddenly blown through the dining room. The beer is sweet. Very sweet and woodsy and burboun barrelish. Toffee and cashew brittle. Caramel and obnoxious fun. Very fresh barley malt with a tart fermented edge, same as the aroma with subtle hints of caraway and the creamy light nuttiness of pinoli with brown sugar and faint sweetened peanut butter. Then sha-BAM, POW, WAP! Hi, I'm the hop poltergeist and I'm here to f#%k your shit up. Spiraling into another dimension, I try to grasp the concept of, and ultimately put into words, how the hops transform the cloying sweetness into a balance that the scales of Themis would struggle to achieve. I, however can tell you who the perpetrator is: chinook. His astringent bitterness long outlasts the sugary malt and the wonderful tropical pineapple grapefruit orange like mango 'fruity' hops and rasps away any sweetness that is brave enough to linger. Hell, there's even hints of motor oil. But there IS NOT any trace of alcohol.

MF- this other struggle happens in the feel. There's a slickness, an oily alpha acid tongue roughening numbing bitterness altogether with sugary somethings and cheek drying alcohol. No burn in the chest, no sense of sipping a cocktail, only the buzzing of your body and the awareness in your mind that you've damn near written a novel to review a beer. Lip stickiness I can feel my mustache and beard hairs sticking together. I feel proud.

D- overall, southern tier is my new favorite American brewery, at least for its imperial series. I'm embarrassed at how many times I've passed them by. Unearthly, mokah, java, creme brulee, and pumking all deserve a plot of land on the moon. Or mars, whichever we get to first. The play of sweet on bitter here astounds me. Like I don't know whether to 5 it or not. BUT-- if there's question, it must not be the one. Damn close though.

Serving type: bottle

10-17-2012 01:17:56 | More by hustlesworth

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3.75/5  rDev -8.5%

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CrazyDavros

Australia

4.05/5  rDev -1.2%
look: 5 | smell: 4 | taste: 4 | feel: 3.5 | overall: 4.25

Pours amber with a large, lasting head.
Sweet aroma, loads of caramel malt but also soft tropical fruit, peach and biscuity malt.
Very malty flavours too, lots of sweet clean malt. Some of the fruit transfers through. Pretty bitter in the finish but the malt wins out. A fair bit of booze shows.
Could use more carbonation.

Serving type: on-tap

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