Beer Sellers: City Beer Store, San Francisco
ABV: 7.7%
Origin: Escondido, California, USA
Website: www.stonebrew.com
Stone Ruination IPA. With lots of hops.
Stone is one of the most prominent and successful of new generation Californian micros, thanks to the quality of its beers and to a risky and slightly macho but ultimately rather savvy marketing policy that makes a virtue of appealing to minority tastes, seen most notoriously in its Arrogant Bastard Ale (“This is an aggressive beer. You probably won’t like it.”) The company was founded by Steve Wagner and Greg Koch in 1996, originally in San Marcos at a plant now occupied by the equally renowned but rather more cuddly Port Brewing. Stone has been in much bigger premises since 2007, and is looking to expand further, even considering opening its own plant in Europe.
Ruination IPA has been around since 2002, when it was launched as a deliberately aggressive hoppy beer generously overloaded with Magnum and Centennial: its 100+ IBUs are claimed to have a “ruinous” effect on your palate. It was one of the first hardcore West Coast “hophead” beers I tried — plucked unwittingly from the chiller cabinet of Whole Foods Market, it proved to be a baptism of fire.
This mid-gold ale has a fine creamy white head and a seriously pungent resinous hop aroma with notes of strawberry fruit, roses and bracing minerals. Assertively thistly resinous hop flavours and tangy tangerine peel are just about supported by firm toffee malt on a palate that also has a piney detergent bite. The swallow is even hoppier, with a long and surprisingly smooth finish thickly laced with peppery bitter syrup and sacky vegetal flavours. Subtle it ain’t, but it’s certainly memorable.
Read more about this beer at ratebeer.com: http://www.ratebeer.com/beer/stone-ruination-ipa/14709/
Leave a Reply