Brussels Beer Project: Pico Nova – Zero West Coast IPA (Belgium: Low Alcohol: 0.3% ABV)
Visual: Clear browned gold. An inch of off white mounded head. Very little carbonation visible.
Nose: Ovaltine. Crushed bourbon biscuits. Malt chocolate. Musty hop character and bitterness. Choc orange. Brown bread and sour dough.
Body: Ovaltine. Greenery. Moderate hop bitterness. Slight iced tea. Slight toffee. Fresh calls to grapefruit.
Finish: Iced tea. Lemon pancakes. Moderate hop bitterness. Slight choc orange. Malt drinks. Dry coffee remains. Slight grapefruit hints in the air. Vanilla. Lightly peppery.
Conclusion: Generally when I think of a west coast IPA I think dry, an out of the way malt character, high hop bitterness and sometime a bit of hop fruitiness and/or tartness to go along with it.
This actually feels quite malt led, which is both odd for a west coast, and impressive for a low alcohol beer that can’t use too much of the malt to get the flavor. There is a lot of malt drinks, malt chocolate and even some dry toffee notes in there. Despite being traditionally sweet notes, they don’t express here in a very sweet way, so it isn’t like it tastes like a bigger, sweeter East Coast IPA – it is just a tad sweeter, darker and more present malt than you would expect from its description.
The hops are moderately bitter, prickly, with a bit of greenery amongst the notes. Not super heavy, but noticeable over the malt character so doing the job that hops should do. The hop flavours that come from that are subtly done. There is a gentle backing freshness that calls to grapefruit, and a slight sweetness to the chocolate malt that calls to choc orange. Nothing too out there, just a slight freshness and rounding sweetness that adds to that base.
Behind all this is a pretty savoury, bready basic character that, again, is weightier than expected. There are some slight low abv tells to this, mainly in a hint of that iced teas style, but generally its tendency is towards being more a neutral feeling middle than anything obviously low alcohol.
It is kind of west coast, but feels half east and half west coast overall – nothing too showy, though the slightly tart notes pick up as the beer goes on which is welcome. A reasonable beer that doesn’t quite fit a style or a theme, and can end up slightly indistinct in character as a result despite having some quite big feeling flavours in there.
Not bad, does the bitterness well, but needs a bit of sparkle to help it really work.
Background: Now most people who have been around this blog a while will know I love a good West Coast IPA. So, when I saw, as part of my recent batch of low alcohol beers from light drinks, that they were calling one a 0.3% abv west coast IPA it had my attention. Even more intriguing it is a Belgian brewery doing it, which is not what I would have expected. Went back to some classic 90s tunes with Garbage’s first self titled album for music. I still adore that album.
