Tuesday, April 28, 2015

Black IPA (Santa Fe Brewing Company)

Santa Fe Brewing’s Black IPA pours with an extremely dark brown coloration and a thick, foamy off-white head. The beer’s initial nose provides imbibers with hints of malt and grain with only a small amount of hop bitterness. This Black IPA has a creamy body that allows a strong hop element to exist at the end of each sip. By having such a wide array of flavors, Santa Fe’s Black IPA is able to obfuscate a decent alcohol content (7.1%). There is a roasted flavor here that provides further depth to this effort; by touching upon the sweet, smoky, bitter, and malty elements, the Santa Fe Black IPA is able to stay fresh and interesting from the beginning to the end of the beer.


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The lacing on this Black IPA is fabulous, working its way down the glass demarcating each time that one takes a sip. As the beer continues to warm, there are more sweet and malt elements that come into the periphery. The toasted aspect of Santa Fe’s Black IPA really comes into focus at these later swigs; the beer is able to keep its backbone admirably without moving too far into a hop or a sweeter flavor profile.  This beer is a great introduction for those that wish to ultimately move into hoppier efforts. The fuller flavor profile of the Black IPA creates a chorus while a number of pure IPAs represent more of a singular voice.


For more information about the variety of efforts that the Santa Fe Brewing Company releases, visit their domain at santafebrewing.com/ . If you find yourself in the brewery’s distribution area (Arizona, Colorado, Kansas, Louisiana, Missouri, New Mexico, Nevada, Oklahoma and Texas), make it a point to search out some of their offerings. Check out our Freestyle Pilsner review as well.


Rating: 9.0/10


 


Black IPA / 7.10% ABV / Santa Fe Brewing Company / twitter.com/santafebrew / www.facebook.com/SantaFeBrewing /