Flying Dog - Double Pale Ale

As you could imagine, my weekend was not nearly as exciting as my beer reviewing partners was. However, as you can see in the background of my picture we did get our Christmas tree up! The good news is that it sounds as though Dunz will be returning to reviewing as soon as tonight since he called me after finding some delicious new brews! Its good to know a little garage fire cant get in the way of good beer. We have our priorities...

Today I have decided to review a nice, big, American minded brew. Part of Flying Dog's "Canis Major" series, this Double Pale Ale is a double batch of their standard pale ale packed full of hops and dry hopped for that added umph! The nose on this brew is a straight result of those Cascade and Columbus dry hops. Citrusy, slightly grassy with some of that pale, caramel malt in the background. The brew pours an amber/orange and is somewhat cloudy due to its lack of being filtered. A solid, frothy head lingers for a minute or two before collapsing under the weight of its 11.2% abv! Oh baby. Lets get a taste of this beast!

Very viscous and hoppy for sure. Alcohol is clearly present but not enough to deter you from having another sip. Dang... I can feel it hitting me already! You can definitely tell the base of this beer being a pale ale and not a separate recipe built for a double IPA even though this beer falls into that category. The maltiness of a pale ale is there to back up the extra hops added to make this a solid Imperial IPA. I wish I had their normal pale ale to compare. Maybe another time... Halfway through the beer and the flavors are starting to come together more. The hops back off slightly and the caramel of the lighter crystal malts used to give the amber color to this beer come through. The alcohol keeps this brew from becoming cloyingly sweet even though the body on this sucker is huge. Medium carbonation compliments this bold K-9.

Overall this is around a 4.7/6 for me. This double pale ale is right up my alley. Big, hoppy, strong malt backbone, excellent to sip during a frigid day with a fire going in your living room. I could easily drink this four pack throughout an evening. Just make sure you arent going anywhere afterwards!

Flying Dog has a great website and gives you lots of information on their brews. Check out more information about this beer here. Established in 1983, Flying Dog has their original brewpub located in Aspen, Colorado but they brew their beer out of a state of the art facility in Frederick, Maryland. Apparently, as the story goes, the founders almost died on while trying to climb the mountain K2. After making it back down K2 without perishing in a frosty, frothy way they stopped at a bar and saw a picture of a flying dog. From that time on they dubbed the "flying dog" as a symbol to show that you can do anything if you aren't told what you cant do.