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Beer Style of the Month: West Coast IPA

Style of the Month West Coast IPA

Strong, bold and often bitter, California’s West Coast IPA craze helped fortify the craft beer movement and inspire hop-forward beers the world over.  

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The beer that kicked off the “haze craze” was the “Heady Topper,” an esoteric unfiltered ale with distinct citrus and tropical fruit notes that was in regular rotation at The Alchemist, a beloved brewpub near Stowe, Vermont. When Hurricane Irene badly damaged the micro-brewery in 2011, its owner started canning Heady Topper to raise money for the rebuild. It was a hit, obviously. Within a few years, brewers across North America had embraced the East Coast IPA to the point that it started to eclipse the West Coast IPA, the original star of the India Pale Ale scene.  

You may taste
Hops! Specifically Cascade hops, which essentially define this style and impart a zesty, spicy flavour profile and a potent hit of citrusy grapefruit. West Coast IPAs also usually make use of other hops, such as Chinook, Centennial, Columbus and Citra, so you can expect a range of notes, including sharp pine, resin and other “green” flavours, as well as lemon and orange oils. Often as not, this full-bodied beer has a bitter edge, which is balanced out with a rich malty sweetness that usually has a distinct caramel taste and somehow manages to bring all these extreme flavours together. 

Sip them with
Most West Coast IPAs are higher in alcohol than a lot of beers, and the very strongest are a challenge to pair with food. A surprising number of slightly lighter expressions are brilliant matches with certain foods, however, especially rich and spicy Thai and Indian dishes. Drinking complex hoppy ale with hot food may have been the beer pairing nobody saw coming but, once people tweaked to it, serving West Coast IPAs with everything from coconut ginger chicken soup to fish curries from southern India really caught on. And, if that’s not your jam, it’s worth mentioning that you can’t go wrong with a West Coast IPA and plate of buffalo chicken wings.        

Serving tips
Given that it’s one of the world’s most popular beer styles, it’s hardly surprising that the West Coast IPA has its own glass—specially designed to show off all the wild aromas and flavours. If you can’t track one down, though, any pint glass with a narrow base that allows you to nose the top will be just fine. And since you’re drinking it for its complexity, serving it at 10 degrees or so—much warmer than most beer is served—is practically mandatory. Cold temperatures tamp down the flavour of this character-rich beer.


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Beer FAQs

Your Top Questions Answered

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What is craft beer?

Craft beer is made by small-scale breweries, often independently owned, that practise traditional artisanal brewing techniques to create authentic and uniquely flavourful beers. These craft brewers may focus on either classic or lesser-known styles of traditional beer, or create innovative new modern brews. 

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How many calories are in a beer?

A standard 340-millilitre or 12-ounce beer that has five per cent alcohol by volume has about 150 calories. Styles of beer that contain more alcohol, such as IPAs, have more calories — up to 170. Light beers, which have less alcohol, have around 100 calories. While darker beers sometimes have a higher alcohol content and therefore more calories, that’s not always the case: consider Guinness Draught, a dark stout, which has just over four per cent alcohol by volume and 125 calories per 12 ounces. 

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How many beers are in a keg?

Most standard North American kegs hold 58.7 litres: in terms of standard 340-millilitre or 12-ounce bottles or cans, that’s 165 servings; if you’re counting by 16-ounce pints, its 124 servings. European beers often come in 50-litre kegs, yielding 140 340-millilitre glasses or 105 pints. Smaller 30-litre kegs (sometimes called “pony kegs”) give 82 standard beers or 62 pints. Mini-kegs (Heineken, for example) hold five litres: that’s about 10 pints or 14 glasses. 

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How is beer made?

All beer is made with four key ingredients: barley (or other grains), water, hops and yeast. First, barley is malted (meaning the grains are sprouted and then kiln-dried) to get ready for brewing. The malt is then mashed, or cooked with warm water, to create a sugary liquid called wort. The wort is boiled with flavouring hops, and then in the final step, it’s fermented with yeast, which creates the alcohol and finished beer.

There are many different styles and regional traditions of brewing, but to simplify, they basically fall into two categories: for ale, the beer is stored at room temperature while the yeast feeds on the sugar in the wort and produces CO2 and alcohol as by-products; for lager, fermentation is the same, but it happens at cooler temperatures so the process takes a little longer

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How long does beer last?

Check for an expiry or best-before date on bottles and cans: “best” is best when consumed fresh. Bottles and cans stored at room temperature are safe to drink for at least four months after purchase and up to eight months when it’s stored in the refrigerator or a cool place. Draft or craft beer stored in a glass bottle keeps for two or three days in the refrigerator when tightly capped. And remember, keep beer away from light: it can develop a “skunky” flavour from a chemical reaction to UV light, which is why it’s usually packaged in cans or dark glass bottles.

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What is beer made of?

Most beer is made from just barley, water, hops and yeast. That’s all! Each ingredient contributes to the beer’s flavour, as do the specifics of the production process. Some brewers may use other grains, such as corn, rye, rice, wheat or even oats, to produce different types of beer. Some styles even incorporate additional flavouring ingredients, including fruits and herbs.