CulturAle Press

Dulles Airport Take-Off Tasting Tour:  Sterling, Ashburn and more: Twinpanzee Aud3o, an NE IPA with IBUs from Sterling, Va.

Date:  April  18, 2019

The Story—  Twinpanzee is one of a nest of breweries in the Sterling area.   None are very walkable to a night’s rest (other than your car in the parking lot), but they’re so close that an UberCrawl won’t make you sell the ranch.

Twinpanzee has one of the cutest logos and one of the smallest brew systems of any in the group.   They don’t hit a home run with every batch, but the surprise, honestly, is that they turn out as many beers as they do that compare well with breweries with more sophisticated systems.

The NEIPA style exploded from a smoldering idea in Vermont’s Alchemist brewery not long ago.  Versions vary wildly.   The idea of the NEIPA was to brew a beer with a softer bitter profile than the West Coast IPAs that dominated the market.   Alchemist’s Heady Topper became a cult favorite overnight as the small brewery didn’t have a chance of keeping up with demand.   Copykettle versions of it sprung up all over New England and, seemingly almost instantly other American and European breweries as well.

But the copiers didn’t have the tightly held recipe and focused on different elements of the “style” to replicate.  Today NEIPA tends to imply a beer that is cloudy to murky, low in IBUs, and with big fruity hop flavors and aromas.  But Heady had a bitter touch that kept things in balance.   And, though Heady asked you to keep her in the can while you drank her, if you poured it into a glass (did you also cut the tag off your mattress?) you had a beer that was definitely hazy but far short of impenetrably murky.   A distinct metallic taste seemed to be from hops and we think drinking it from the can may have increased the bitter that was there.

So some critics would rule out today’s featured beer as too bitter for the style.   We don’t.  The 63 IBUs are nicely appropriate for a 6.7% IPA and they’re partly kept in check by a firm malt and some chalkiness.  We think heady would smile on this cover.

We’ll grant that IPAs are easier to brew than low alcohol and light beers, so it’s no surprise that Twinpanzee’s best efforts are with the IPAs, but a small brewer can screw up any style and these guys turn out a range of IPAs that differ in taste but not in quality.  Definitely worth a stop if you’re in the area.

The Beer—  63 IBUs are big for a NEIPA but they mostly hide well until a very late citrus bitter.  It tends to chalky and fruity and even slightly creamy until the bitter end.

Value — Fair.  These guys don’t brew much and don’t give it away.   Prices exceed other nearby breweries.

About these posts:  We taste and evaluate over a thousand beers every year.  The beers posted here rank in the top quarter of those tastings.   Values:  “fair” is a good beer at an above market price, “good” is worth the money, “very good” is a bargain, and “excellent” is a steal.

For the next several weeks we’ll feature fun places to explore beer — and much more–a different destination each week.   Our beers of the day will feature beers from this wonderfully wet destinations.  This week we’re featuring beers in the Dulles-Sterling are of Northern Virginia.    A caveat as always: the vast majorities of craft breweries may have a few beers that are usually available, but their most interesting beers are usual season or one-off brews that we may rave about, but you can’t find.   Our specific beer descriptions can tell you what sorts of beers the brewery does well; if you don’t find the exact beer on tap, you’ll probably find something similar.