Beer of the Week

The beer: Heady Topper

The brewery: The Alchemist Brewery, Stowe, Vermont

Description (from BeerAdvocate): "Heady Topper is an American double IPA. This beer is not intended to be the biggest or 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 you mouth. So drinkable, it's scary. Sometimes 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 in a glass smells nice, but it releases the essential hop aromas that we have work 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 while pouring. This beer is perishable, and at its best when it is young, fresh and hazy. Keep it cold, but not ice cold. Drink this beer immediately, we are always making more."

Would I buy it again? Alas, I had to commit a great beer crime to get this picture, but this is the second Heady Topper I've had; the first was drunk properly from the can. And my opinion on a beer that's was rated in 2018 as the fourth-best beer in the world and still carries a perfect score on BeerAdvocate? 

I mean, it's good – juicy, hoppy, and pretty easy to drink – but one of my favorites? No. I am not, and never will be, an IPA guy.

To be clear though, neither example I had were at their prime, having gone through what my friend described as "refrigerator aging." A polite term for "they've been sitting around longer than I'd care to admit." I mean, free beer is free beer, and you do not turn down a beer with its own Wikipedia page, no matter how old. However, what I did drink was good enough that I would definitely consider buying a fresh one. If it's this good so far past its prime, I can only imagine what its like fresh from the brewery.