American Pale Wheat - Tasting

One of the main things that attracted me to homebrewing was being able to drink well hopped beers as they should be consumed - very fresh.  This seems like an area where it is very difficult for commercial brewers to compete with home brewers.  The American Pale Wheat I'm drinking right now was sitting on dry hops just 10 days ago.  It's very unlikely that, here in Phoenix, I could go to the BevMo and buy any beer this fresh.

This beer had a pretty huge hop bill (9 oz of hops for 4.5 gal of beer).  A majority of those hops (5 oz) were added as dry hops after fermentation completed.  I was a bit skeptical that those dry hops would really be worth the $15 or so that I spent on them but after smelling this beer I have to say that it was definitely worth the cost and that I would gladly do it again.  The beer was very nice at the end of primary fermentation but it was nowhere close to where it is now in term of aromatic quality.  I can only imagine how great it would be if I was kegging this beer and it was sitting on hops until the moment I served it.  Kegging might have to be something I move forward on in the near term.  I've been drinking it for 5 days now and I really believe that the aroma isn't quite as potent as it was for that first beer.  Still very good though.

I am happy with how this one turned out.  It's going to be interesting to see how quickly the aromatics fade.  I may have to drink this one fairly quickly.

Tasting Notes:

• Aroma:
• Intense citrus/tropical/fruit smell on the nose.  A mix of grapefruit and orange mostly.  A very sweet/very pleasant smell to it.  No malt and no yeast character present. 
• Appearance:
• Nice golden color to the beer.  There's a lot of hop particulate matter that clouds the beer a bit.  It's not as clear as I would have liked.  With a more delicate pour I was able to get pretty decent clarity for the picture.  Pretty nice head to the beer but it does fade quickly.
• Flavor:
• Up front I get a lot of fruity/citrusy hop flavor.  Very little alcohol flavor in this beer.  It finishes with a subdued but nice bitterness and maybe a tiny bit of malt.  It's a very dry beer - no sweetness to it at all.  Very much a beer where the hops are running the show - not balanced in any sense of the word.  As it warms up a bit I think I'm getting some characteristics that I would describe as "dank."
• Mouth-Feel:
• I think the carbonation could be a little higher.  The beer doesn't feel thin but I think some more priming sugar wouldn't be a bad thing if I were to make this again.
• Overall:
• This is a very nice sessionable hoppy beer.  I'm not sure I would call it refreshing enough to sit out in the sun without a glass of water to go along with it but it's definitely very easy drinking.  The hop flavor is exactly what I had hoped it would be.

So, this is definitely the best tasting beer I've brewed so far.  I am very curious about how close I got to the original beer.  Next time I am in CA I will have to track some Fortunate Islands down.  I have been a bit worried that bottling, and the oxygen exposure inherent with it, would make brewing a quality hoppy beer difficult for me.  With this one I'm convinced that it is possible, and not that difficult, to brew a very good hoppy beer even if you are bottling.