Last night, we spent a few hours in the company of fellow beer drinkers enjoying the release of our ‘collaboration’ beer, “It’s Dangerous To Go Alone.”
Here, take this:
The details of the creative process are here, so we won’t belabor those points too much. My main curiosity going into this were threefold:
- Would it be hibiscus-y?
- Would the Hull Melon hops work with the hibiscus flavor?
- Would it be appropriately colored?
The answer, I’m happy to report, is yes, yes and yes.
Pouring a hazy reddish-gold with a beautiful sorbet-pink wispy head, It’s Dangerous To Go Alone is crisp, complex and harmoniously herbal — the fruity qualities of the hops meld nicely with the tea-like flavors of the hibiscus. As it warms, some nice melon-y aromas emerge and savory flavors float up from the hibiscus.
It’s a little medicinal, but overall it’s a good unified flavor pairing that doesn’t present itself as two different things — the blend of the two main ingredients really did pair well with each other.
It’s not sweet, but it is light bodied and very easy drinking, especially for a 6.3% ABV beer — almost dangerously easy drinking. It’s exactly the kind of beer I want to drink on the first 50+ degree day of spring, sitting on the back porch in a sweatshirt.
It’s cool weather beer, not gushingly moist and wheat-sweet for summer, nor heavy and dark and oppressive for winter. Even though this was envisioned as a Valentine’s day offering, this will be a great springtime drinker and I hope it sticks around until then. wait, no I don’t, I want them to sell all of it immediately. right? I’m not sure. I’m conflicted. I do know I’ll be back for more.
Having our site name on the menu is pretty cool, too.
While brewer Ben Saller and I discussed last night if we would want to change anything, we decided we’ve kinda hit the sweet spot where the hibiscus and hops balance — add more hops and the bitterness might overpower the herbal qualities and make this just another single-hop APA, whereas too much hibiscus and it would just get overwhelmingly savory and tea-like.
As always, thanks to Ben and John Saller and the whole Atlas team for letting us come play in their sandbox for a little while, and also to hang out with some of you fine folks for an evening of beer related dorkery. Making beer is fun. Everyone should do it more often.