Triple IPA? Triple WTF!

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 Odell Brewing Company's 11.1% ABV triple IPA, Fee Fi Fo Fum.

I’ve gotten to like IPA’s okay, although for me they were an acquired taste. I still prefer a good pale ale. Micro-brewers apparently do not—in part, I suspect, because the extra “hoppiness” of an IPA obscures imperfections that would not escape detection in a pale ale.

That’s as may be. But what has struck me as a stunt is the double IPA. They’re not bad, as far as they go, but they don’t really offer an improved experience, just a higher ABV pitching in pretty much the same league as Belgian beer (which, for the benefit of the uninitiated, usually has the same ABV as wine and sometimes north of that).

So the double IPA is dubious enough. But a triple IPA? Come on. It makes Fonzie jumping the shark seem like a scene from “The Cherry Orchard.”


Don't believe me?  Then believe this a takedown of the Triple IPA.

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