The Alchemist Heady Topper Double IPA

Guess what?

 I'm a terrible beer ticker.

Looking at the current BeerAdvocate Top 250, I haven't had the 10 best beers in the world.
Number Ten, Bourbon Barrel Aged Vanilla Bean Dark Lord from Three Floyds, has not been reviewed by yours truly, although I'm sure I've had a taste of it once, at least. Let's look at the rest of the list: Parabola Imperial Stout from California's Firestone Walker at 9, Goose Island Bourbon County Brand Stout  (or BCBS if you want to cut to the chase) at 8, 3F's Zombie Dust sits at 7 ( a pale ale in the top ten? Shocking!), Trappist Westveleteren 12 has fallen all the way to 6 from it's eternal perch at 1, at 4 and 5 the brothers from Founders, CBS and KBS (if you have to ask, you're no beer geek), with 2 and 3 occupied by the father and son team of the Plinys from Russian River, leaving number one to the pride of Waterbury, Vermont, a canned double IPA from the Alchemist Brewery, their only beer, Heady Topper.

Dave Anderson was kind enough to spot me a can, and now, at long last I can scratch that itch, and tick away that top beer and see if it's really the finest ale in all the land, better than the works of the most pious and hermetic of monks. I'll just paste those notes (beer was consumed a few nights ago) right here:


Heady Topper-The Alchemist-Vermont. Ale. Alc. 8% by Vol.,1 pint.

"Heady Topper is an American Double India Pale Ale. This beer is not intended to be the biggest of most bitter. It is meant to give you wave after wave of hoppy goodness on your palate. Tremendous amounts of American hops will creep up on you, and leave you with a dense hoppy finish in your mouth. So drinkable, it scary.
Sometime I wish I could crawl right into the can. Freshness and control have always been my main concern when it comes to our beer. We are committed to providing you with an unfiltered and unpasteurized  hop experience. Why do I recommend that you drink it from the can? Quite simply, to ensure a delightful, hop experience. The act of pouring it into a glass smells nice, but it releases the essential hop aromas that we have worked so hard to retain. If you MUST pour it into a glass, you may find that some of the hop resins have settled to the bottom --leave them in the can when pouring. This beer is perishable, and at it's best when young, fresh, and hazy. Keep it cold but not ice cold. Drink this beer immediately we are always making more. --John Kimmich, The Alchemist, Waterbury, Vermont."

Bullcrap, it's going into a glass, because I MUST.

I'm scratching my head to make sense out of this sentence: "The act of pouring it into a glass smells nice, but it releases the essential hop aromas that we have worked so hard to retain." So... what should be done with these hops aromas if not release them to, I don't know, smell nice? Are they supposed to remain in the can, pleasing no one? Can someone figure that one out for me, it makes my brain hurt...

Also note that the illustration on the can clearly shows a man drinking his from a glass. If he were drinking from a can, one with the same illustration featuring himself, we could have the beer version of a comic book with an "Infinity cover."

But on to the beer, enough of the gobbledygook:

It's a hazy one, a deep orange/apricot color, not bright, not golden, but clearly it's own thing. It is what it is. The head is a gigantic, prodigious, brogdignagian thing, mushroom capped, blooming with chalk white froth, lace-leaving and slow to leave. Gorgeous look on it.

Aroma: funky, musty, wicked, and weird. I'm at a loss. Thinking about Belgian yeast, thinking about putting a mare to bed. And then the typical hop aromatics creep out, some orange, some mango, grapefruit. None too bitter, either, not too brash, bold or out of control. Juuust right. A delight for the nose.

Taste: Jumps on the tongue and spills out brilliant hoppy flavor. Tingles the tongue in all right ways. Trickles over the palate, leaving happy hop deliciousness everywhere. …"from the can!"…not as complex, not as …gosh, is there a difference? or are we fooling ourselves? From the can, you get the hop blast, you get the flavor, you get the buzz, it's creamy and palatable…but you don't get everything. It's like having sex with a wool sock over your manhood, it's just not bringing it all home, if you know what I mean. I wonder why The Alchemist wants to cover this beer up, hide it in a can? Are they trying to elude the look of the brew, do they think people will dislike the chaos and disarray, the multitude of floating particles, as if it's unnatural and ugly?

Full-bodied, long bitter finish. Really tasty, very satisfying and delicious. Best IPA of all? Naaah… but close...

more bitterness, in the dregs...

End of notes. Best beer of all? Better than Gouden Carolus Cuvee van de Kaiser Blau (No. 147.)? Better than Rodenbach Grand Cru (No. 155.)? Better than Orval (No. 237.)? Westmalle Tripel (112)? Trappistes Rochefort 10 (16)?  Not according to me. But this ranking clearly shows that many beer reviewers online do not have a predilection towards the complex flavors in a Belgian ale, and more often than not are skewed towards the hop bomb, especially if it's a "Whale", i.e., elusive and difficult to obtain.
There's no point in complaining that this list will be dominated by bourbon barrel imperial stouts and hen's teeth rare double IPA, punishing and abrasive, it's simply the nature of today's beer geek crowd.
All in all, a tasty brew, surrounded by baffling hype.