india pale ale

At the beginning of their careers, brewers face an important decision: Do they want to make the classics of their industry their hobbyhorse, or do they want to leave the well-trodden path of their predecessors and explore the only recently opened terrain of creative, hop-intensive, wild beers? The Mammut Craft Beer team from Montenegro chose option number 2 and has been brewing what they like to drink ever since.

A fine specimen that arose from her love of experimentation is her India Pale Ale. This beer was originally one of the down-to-earth classics, but was picked up by the craft beer movement and subjected to extensive modernization. Like many of its colleagues, the variant from Mammut is stuffed to the brim with hops. The brewers used four American aroma hop varieties to give their beer maximum flavor. Along with the richness of flavors comes a certain bitterness that cleverly balances the juicy notes of fruit, resin and citrus. A good portion of malt acts as a rounding factor: the grain provides the wonderfully bright copper color and brings robust and roasted notes to the beer.

In contrast to many modern IPAs, Mammut’s interpretation is fairly tame and extremely drinkable: fruit, bitterness and malt are wonderfully balanced.