I’ve been trying to have this beer almost every night this week, but something always seem to come up. Finally, it’s Friday night, and I’ve got a chance to sit down, watch some TV, and crack this one open. This is one of the beers that my sister picked up for me on her trip to Asheville, NC a couple months ago. You can’t judge a book by its cover, but I really like the graphics on this bottle.
Location: Poured into a Stella Artois chalice at my home in Bloomington, IL.
Numbers: 6.25% ABV, 78 IBUs, 7.1 SRM, ~175 Calories
Ingredients: Hops: Simcoe, Columbus, Centennial, and Cascade.
Appearance & Aroma: It’s golden-orange color and extremely clear with sediment floating in it. There’s a fair amount of carbonation in it, but the head is fairly thin and foamy, leaving some good lacing on the glass. The aroma is a mix of resin and citrus hoppiness.
Taste & Feel: The beer is medium bodied with a smooth mouthfeel. There’s a sightly sweet honey-like malt and citrusy hop flavor up front. The bitterness comes in during the middle, along with some pine, resin and citrus hop flavors. The bitterness peaks in the finish, surpassing the hop flavors, but both the citrus, pine, and resin flavors and bitterness last for a minute in the aftertaste.
Food Pairing: This beer has a good amount of hop flavor, which works well with some bar foods, such as pizza, burgers, and fried foods.
Overall Impression: It was a solid IPA with a nice mix of hops that gave it a range of hop flavors – pine, resin, and citrus. I like the hop flavors, but the bitterness was a bit sharp in the finish, which is not unexpected for an IPA. I was hoping it would have a bit more hop aroma and dry-hopped characteristics, but I’m unsure of the age of this beer. I loved the label and think it’s one of the nicest designed labels of any beer I’ve had. Overall, it was a good, solid IPA with a good mix of hop flavors, and I’d like to try more of Foothills’ brews.
My Rating: 
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