The Beer Road

Whether or not you are a craft beer aficionado or somewhat new to the scene, you know their name.  They are one of the largest craft breweries in the US in terms of production, their “Off Centered” ales are some of the most recognizable around, and never mind their owner was the focus of a Discovery Channel series focusing on craft beer.  Their most popular beers, a series of India Pale Ales, are often only referred to by their roll off the tongue abbreviations: 60 Minute, 90 Minute, 120 Minute.  Based in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, Dogfish Head owns a spot in the national craft beer scene that few other breweries do, an instantly recognizable name no matter what your own familiarity with craft beer may be.  No matter if you’re a fan or not, you know their beer.  And this weekend, in Roanoke, you can get to know them – and a couple of their harder to find beers – a little bit better.

Describing how long a “constant addition of hops” is given the beer during the early stages of their brewing, the names of their 60 Minute, 90 Minute, and the limited releases of their highly sought after 120 Minute IPAs may be similar, but the way these beers taste from one to another are far from slight, and it goes well beyond anything the hops do for the individual beers.  As the amount of hops and their built in bittering effects and flavors increases across these brews, Dogfish Head increases the amount of malt, or malted grain in them as well, to help balance things out with an accompanying level of sweetness.  In short, with each step in the “Minute” series, the flavor intensifies, as basically more of each ingredient is added.  The 60 Minute, available at Blue 5 Restaurant on a regular basis, is a wonderful, easy to drink, fairly well balanced IPA.  What I think of as one of the best IPAs for anyone new to the style, 60 Minute has ample amount of citrusy, grapefruit like flavors, a bit of pine like taste, and a manageable amount of bitterness.  A bit of a rarity to find on tap however is the 90 Minute.  Added to the draft selection just a day ago at Local Roots Restaurant here in Roanoke, with this beer, those 60 Minute type flavors increase, to a puckering juicy level of citrus, as does the bitterness, but is countered by a well proportioned amount of malty sweetness.  The once a year release of 120 Minute?  Well, it would be unfair to say this is merely a step further.  The intensity of flavor here, quite frankly, is an experience all of its own.  A complex and intense beer with a high level of sweetness, a heavy, almost syrupy body, and hop flavors of perhaps apricots and other citrus, this brew is meant to be sipped over the course of some time, perhaps with a friend.  As a matter of fact, try doing that exactly – you’ll get a kick out of how the flavors change with the warming of the beer.  Of course, more malt means more sugars for the yeast to convert to alcohol, so with each step, the level of alcohol increases as well with these beers, and by the time you’re at the 120 Minute, the abv% is around eighteen percent.  Yet another reason to have fun tasting experience with another beer curious pal.  As hinted earlier today on their facebook page, Blue 5 will be tapping 120 Minute today, around happy hour.

How interesting this is, to have these three IPAs on draft in Roanoke at one time.  There are a lot of possibilities here – the chance to try hard to find beers, such as the 90 and 120 Minute IPAs, the chance to get to know Dogfish Head beers better, the chance to compare them all (the 60 and 90, especially).  Whatever your tasting curiosities are, there’s another great craft beer weekend in Roanoke right around the corner!

Visit their website here!

~ by thebeerroad on March 9, 2012.

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