Beer of the Weekend #416: Hipster Ale

My LV piece is almost done. I have been working on it for the last three hours and just need to write an ending that smoothly segues into the kicker. (This, by the way, is what I love about reporting: the thrill of crafting.) I will return to it with a fresh and well-hydrated mind tomorrow.

With a fridge full of beer, what did I do today? Buy a $15 sixer. It makes no sense.

The beer of the weekend is Hipster Ale, brewed by Evil Twin Brewing of Valby, Denmark.


According to the beer’s Evil Twin webpage and the can, the beer is brewed at the Westbrook Brewing Company of Mount Pleasant, South Carolina. Perhaps it is being contract brewed there. (Even weirder, the Evil Twin head address is located in Brooklyn, New York, but all the staff emails have Danish country codes.)

Serving type: 12-ounce can. “11/08/12 18:06” is printed on the bottom of the can, so I assume that is the date and time it was canned.

Appearance: Poured into a pint glass. The color is hazy, honey/amber. About a finger of eggshell-colored head dissipated fairly quickly to leave a bubbly and spotted lacing, as well as a ring around the edge and trails of foam on the sides of the glass.

Smell: Invigorating citrus — enough to wake one up but nothing overpowering. Grapefruit, orange, a little lemon, and pine. Caramel hangs around in the background, too.

Taste: Just about quintessential. Grapefruit, orange, a touch of lemon, pine, and caramel. The hops offer a light, gritty bitterness that gets the tongue and cheeks tingling. As it warms, the bitterness is turned up a couple notches, enough to consider it an IPA.

Drinkability: Good stuff and a bold pale ale. However, I do not think it is worth $15 for a six-pack. However, I was the one dumb enough to splurge. Hipsters spoil all the cheap fun.

Fun facts about Hipster Ale:

-Style: American Pale Ale.

-Price: $14.99/sixer at John’s Grocery in Iowa City.

-Serving temperature: 40-45ºF.

-Alcohol content: 5.5 percent ABV.

-Nerdiness from the website, which is also on the can:

Perhaps you heard of a worldwide beer-movement that tributes favorite hipster neighbourhoods across the globe. First came Istedgade, Copenhagen then Södermalm, Stockholm followed by Williamsburg, New York and Shoreditch, London accompanied by Trastevere, Rome & last El Raval, Barcelona. If you feel excluded because you’re hip but your city is not, this cutting-edge, ‘hip without borders’ pale ale is an homage to you – the global hipster. Cheers!

I wonder if the next “hipster” beer will be Silver Lake. However, I am not sure what it is about these neighborhoods that warrants frothy tributes. The high rent? The pasty white homogeneity? Hijacked subculture symbols, ideas, and fashion? (Who is to say anyone has rightful ownership of symbols, ideas, and fashion, though.)

-Evil Twin brews a beer called Disco Beer. As an admirer of all things seventies, I will definitely need to track that one down.


The Quiet Man’s grade: A-.

Popular Posts