REVIEW: STONE RUINATION

Et Cetebeer

STATS

Tonight we have another beer from the Stone Brewery in California. This is an American Imperial IPA and I will be very interested to see how it stacks up against others I’ve had. It’s one of my favourite styles, so hopefully this one will be good!

All of the beers I’ve had from this brewery have been awesome! You can see the Arrogant Bastard Ale review here. There not a lot more to say, I’ve had a reasonably tough start to the week and I’m just looking forward to what is hopefully a nice big hop-bomb! If not I’ve always got something else in the fridge, which certainly is a hop-bomb! Anyway let’s do this one first.

Stone Ruination IPA pours a slightly unusual hazy orange colour with a good sized cream coloured head. There appears to be lots of carbonation rising to the head, which I imagine is why the retention is so good. Most of the head lasts for the entirety of drinking, with some minor lacing to the glass. This is an unusual looking IPA but I like the look of it, quite nice.

The nose is pretty full on from the Ruination IPA and if the smell is anything to go by, it’s exactly what I’m looking for! The nose is loaded with floral hops, which overwhelmes almost everything else. There is a slight grapefruit smell towards the end of the nose, however really all I can get it those hops. If you can smell anything else let me know, I’d be interested to hear it.

Ruination IPA is a delicious IPA! There are flavours of pine and citrus, most noticeably grapefruit. The beer starts off relatively sweet and has some pale bready maltiness. But very quickly this is swamped by a huge hoppy bitterness, which is hugely refreshing and biting. The finish has a slight caramel edge to it, but it still has an overall bitter finish. A really fantastic example of what an American Imperial IPA should taste like.

It’s hard to find enough superlatives for this beer, it’s simply sensational! It’s one of the most beautiful IPA’s to drink despite the high ammount of hops present in the beer. A bit of research (reading the label) has led me to discover that this beer has over 100 IBU’s, that’s an enormous number and while it’s bitter it’s one of the smoothest beers you will ever find in this range. Simply a superb Imperial IPA, probably my favourite one ever!

Remember it’s always Beer O’Clock somewhere in the world!