Rough Draft Brewing is the home of my first bonafide craft beer brewery experience. While I had already been on the path to enlightenment for some time, it wasn’t until one Saturday afternoon following a rehearsal at Hindsight (right around the corner), one of my band mates suggested we stop in for a beer.
I didn’t even know what a flight of tasters was back then so I simply started plowing through their selection of IPA’s a full pour at a time… I remember just being blown away at how good beer so fresh out of the tank tasted. The rest, as they say, is history…
That brings us to our featured review of Rough Draft’s Weekday IPA…
The particulars:
- 4.8% ABV
- 43 IBU
- Yeast – Unknown
- Malts – Unknown
- Hops, Citra and Simcoe
Toss it into a glass and I ya get about a-finger-and-a-half’s worth of head that that doesn’t hang around for very long. I’m always a fan of some nice, luxurious suds but at a sessionable 4.8%, one can expect it to be as viscous as some of it’s more potent counter parts.
On the nose you get those nice, piney and citrus aromas you’d expect from the citra and simcoe hops. Slightly more piney than fruity and definitely more robust than you’d expect from a session IPA.
As on the nose, the first sip is also dominated by the pineyness with a side of lemon peel and other citrus characters bringing up the rear but the aforementioned robust quality doesn’t quite carry through to the palate. Slightly peppery with a dry finish that will goad you into another sip.
It’s definitely satisfying if you’re pacing yourself and want to keep to the low end of the ABV scale but unless it is in fact a weekday, many of us would likely opt for something with a little more complexity and an even stronger personality.
The flip side is, this is an excellent gateway beer for anyone you’d like to introduce to IPA’s without scaring them off.
Cheers!
