Day 20: Vixnu

 

Vixnu

Origin: Cervejaria Colorado (Ribeirão Preto, São Paulo, Brazil)

Style: Imperial India Pale Ale (IIPA)

ABV: 9.5%

IBU: 75

Description: I was a little worried upon first opening this beer. As I removed the bottle cap the beer was like a geyser with foam escaping from the bottle all over the table. My first thought was it was infected. Thankfully I was wrong, the beer was just carbonated slightly more than it should have been.

Upon first sniff of Vixnu from Cervjario Colorado I was transported back in time to when IPAs were a different beer than we know today. This reminded me of the IPAs my dad used to drink when the craft beer culture was just starting in the United States. This beer doesn’t have the citrus character of most Imperial India Pale Ales that we know today. The character is more focused on malt with pine and floral hops. The malt character is up front with tons of biscuit, crystal, and pilsner malt. Then hop characters of pine and herbs make themselves present. There is little hop aroma in the beer but lots of resinous pine in the flavour. The malt tends to dominate the overall beer yet it still finishes fairly dry.

If you were looking for a beer that would be similar to Vixnu I would go with No-Li’s Imperial IPA or Central City’s Imperial IPA. Both are malt forward beers with great hop character, though the hop character in both of these beers tends to be more citrus than pine.

Overall I thought this was an enjoyable beer. I can only imagine what it would have tasted like fresh. – O.P.