Weiherer: Fat Head: Imperial IPA (Germany: IIPA: 9% ABV)
Visual: Cloudy apricot skin coloured body with large yellow hue touched bubbled head.
Nose: Grapefruit. Dried banana. Grapes. Wheat flecks. Heavy duty peppery bitterness. Gooseberry. Resinous and lightly hop oils. Black pepper to peppercorns. Multigrain cereal.
Body: Heavy bitterness. Peppery. Peppercorn. Leather. Subtle toffee malt. Light grapefruit. Passion-fruit. Pink peppercorn. Vanilla custard and banana.
Finish: Gunpowder tea. Almost acrid. Peppery. Toffee malt. Charring. Passion-fruit. Pink grapefruit. Pink peppercorn.
Conclusion: Whelp, when this goes hop heavy it does not do it by half! This is my second visit to this beer, first time doing notes. Basically I remembered drinking this and thinking do I like this or not? And I could not remember what conclusion I came to. So, second bite of the cherry, pen in hand, and, do I like it?
Early on I was going to lean towards no, I could appreciate it but not like it. It was one note, bitter as fuck and you know I love me some bitterness, but there was not much else. It always verged on acrid, bitter, peppery, gunpowder tea, only just backing away from the edge.
Which is strange as the aroma promises tangy grapefruit, gooseberry and such notes – but there is initially nothing of the like in the body, much to its detriment. Similarly the malt is very out of the way, something I generally enjoy in a nice bitter west coast IPA, but here the bitterness feels like it needed some pushback.
In the latter two thirds of a pint the malt managed to become only a touch more evident, more notable and that extra feel allows tart fruit notes get to actually show themselves and get some grip. Not heavily showing but enough that I can now say I like this beer at this point.
Which takes us back to the start, so can I say overall that I like this beer? I just said yes at the latter end of the beer, but it is a qualified yes. Early on the beer is a tad too rough edged, and while later on it balances overall it is not great, but it is enjoyable enough with good bitterness and a bit beyond that.
Only a beer I would return to occasionally, but on the whole, yes I enjoy it.
Background: Weiherer is a brewery that I have had much more respect for than my notes may indicated, with most of my faves being the ones I chose to not do notes on. Don’t think I have had anything from Fat Head before but they have a rep for loving the big hops, as do I. As mentioned in the notes I had this before and had a mixed time with it, and it is an expensive one, so was unsure if I was going to grab another, but eventually I decided to grab one from independent spirit just to resolve my mixed memories. This is the result. Music wise I went with Mallavora: What If Better Never Came. Spoiler warning, they are going to come up again in future notes, really enjoy them, found out about them pretty much randomly, annoyed I was ill the day they were playing live locally so missed them.
