Mammoth IPA 395

Mammoth Brewing IPA 395 - DIPA Brewed with Juniper Berries and Sage (2012)

Brewed and Bottled by Mammoth Brewing Company in  Mammoth Lakes, CA. USA.

Year Round Brew.

22 fl. oz. / $4.99 USD / 8% ABV

About: "Our ode to the Owens Valley (Eastern Sierra) and the Highway 395 corridor, this double IPA is distinctly bolder than our Epic IPA and is brewed with locally grown desert sage, mountain juniper berries and wild hops (when available). IPA 395 has a unique personality. Malts: ESB, Crystal, Caramunich and Dark Munich / Hops: Millenium and Centennial / Adjunts: Sage and Juniper Berries."

Our mountains. Our water. Our beer. Mammoth Brewing Company has been brewing award-winning handcrafted beers in the eastern sierra since 1995. The most important ingredient in our beer is our water, and the high sierra has some of the best in the world, fresh out of the mountains and lakes that surrounds us. Welcome to altitude. Brewery Elevation. 8,000'."

Thoughts: 395 poured a super deep, cloudy and hazy orange with shades of amber around the edges. The head nearly exploded halfway through the pour, so I stopped to let it die down a bit for the pic but it never really built back up the second time around. It's off-white, slightly dark, left a small clouded galaxy of smaller and bigger bubbles, and never completely faded away.

This beer smells pretty incredible. It's got a really smooth hop tone throughout, but man do those juniper berries and sage just make the scent of this utterly pleasurable. There's a hint of lemon meringue pie there too. I'm in love with the smell of this beer. I'm almost afraid to taste it.

Yep. This was one of the few beers that I bought on the last vacation day and brought back with me, damn sure glad I did too. It's got a really crisp, earthy hop bite to it. Starts off immediately with citrus, and what would be extremely bitter grassy hops that come rushing in, but here it's accompanied by a perfectly matched sweet malt backup. Juniper berries bring in an abundance of tartness after the swallow, and that blast of tart is very slowly subdued by the sage. The taste of this one, while massive, is extremely clean... must be that quality Alpine water they only use. Weird, since I don't normally notice the water consciously, but this time I did notice a clean crispness to it before I had even read the bottle. It's slightly spicy, peppery, very earthy, and extremely flavorful.

Mouth is a bit frothy to begin then gets really smooth as things warm up a little bit, and it never feels light.

From beginning to end, cold to room temp, this beer tastes fucking great. It's got an abundance of flavors, and while that grassy bit may have given me a concern at first, it's always there, but is laid back and lets all the other ingredients do their thing. Very good.