Sunday, June 29, 2008

He'Brew Bittersweet Lenny's R.I.P.A.


Beer: He'Brew Bittersweet Lenny's R.I.P.A.
Brewery Location: San Francisco, CA
Beer Style: DIPA
ABV: 10%


This is my first beer for review from the Shmaltz Brewing company. I've had several other of their offerings and my particular favorites have been the Genesis 10:10 and Jewbelation 11 anniversary beers. I've been in a bit of a rye kick lately and have been drinking Founders Red Rye and Two Brother's Cane and Ebel quite a bit lately, so I was looking for another rye beer. I found this beer at Party Pak for $6.49 a bomber. I bought two just to be sure. This review is my second bottle of this beer.

This beer has quite the clever name and pays homage to Lenny Bruce with plenty of little quips and other information about Lenny Bruce.

This beer pours a deep and clear ruby color with a decent sized off-white head. The beer sorta glugged out in a syrupy fashion. The first scents bring on the rye mixed in with pine needles and a touch of orange peel. The malt is a beast on the nose on this beer pushing around anything else you could really get a good scent out of. The flavor profile is more of the same with plenty of rye flavor with an almost bready malt being most dominant. The hop profile does a fairly good job though trying to balance out all of the malt, but this beer leans heavier towards the malt and not the hops. The mouthfeel is quite full bodied with plenty of carbonation to go around, but this beer leaves quite a bitter finish. The drinkability is actually quite good, but the 10% ABV will sneak up on your if you have an entire bomber.

I like rye beers, and I thought this beer was a pretty good offering. This beer was quite a bit more maltier than I thought it would be for a DIPA, but it was good that isn't just an over the top hop bomb, but rather a decently crafted beer. If you are a fan of rye and malt I say at least give this beer a try, but you might want to split it with someone.

Cheers!
Matt

6 comments:

Unknown said...

Hey Matt. Thanks for the review on the Bittersweet Lenny's. Glad to see that you enjoyed it. When you have a chance, you should definitely check out our new seasonal, Rejewvenator; a half-doppelbock, half-belgian-inspired dubbel, brewed with almost 500 gallons of fig juice. L'Chaim!!

Matt said...

Zak,

Thank you for posting.
I will be on the lookout next time I head to the store. That sounds quite interesting as well as all the yeast strains that you guys used.

Anonymous said...

Definitely dug the Jewbelation 11th Anniversary, but haven't tried the Lenny's RIPA, even though that's the one I've seen the most of around town. The Rejewvenator wasn't bad, but I definitely liked the 11th above the others I've had.

Jim said...

Next to the Genesis 10:10, the RIPA is my favorite He'Brew. I was also quite impressed with the Monumental Jewbelation 10. I have two bombers of Rejewvenator that I haven't cracked open yet, but will do so over the July 4 weekend.

Genesis Ale and Messiah Bold are both "go to" beers for me when I want to get a six-pack of something I know will be reliably good.

Unknown said...

Hey guys. Thank you so much for the support. We love getting feedback on our beers and it's very satisfying to see that you guys are enjoying the brews.

Jim said...

Sorry to commandeer your comments for a moment, Matt.

Zak, back in December, my beer drinking comrades and I reviewed a number of your beers during Hanukkah. We told Jeremy about it back then and he really enjoyed the review. Yes, we're a bit bizarre, but we like it that way. Anyway, thought you'd like to see the review, too.

Jim from Hoosier Beer Geek.