Circle Archetype Historical IPA

Now this is an impressive brew, from creation to consumption.  Circle Brewery's Archetype Historical IPA is a beer four years in the making, going through several trial runs in an attempt to create a kind of beer that would have been imbibed 300 years ago, brewed in the UK and then shipped by sea to India.  Go here for a rundown of the whole process.  And all that work was definitely not in vain.  The beer poured clear and crisp, a light gold with a fairly frothy head.  Slight earthy aromas abound, with some really subtle hints of lemon, and the flavor was not what i was expecting.  Either through the recreated British malts used in brewing, or the secondary fermentation in the brett-carrying barrels, the beer does not taste like the kind of IPA i'm generally used to.  That being said, West Coast IPA's tend to dominate that market, with their hops in the forefront.  The Archetype really dialed back the hoppiness with much more balance with the malt, creating something that, to me, felt and tasted much more like an ESB.  Either way, it was a delicious, 7.5% brew that i certainly will be revisiting all summer long.

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