Canada is big. You knew that, right? So, when a pal takes a plane for hours and hours to the other end of the nation and is good enough to bring back a few, well, all the beer labels may as well be written in Hungarian. You never see this things back here. Happy then was I to be handed a Phillips Brewing Hoperation Tripel Cross Belgian IPA. Sure, the label looks like something out of a movie credits but that makes sense I suppose if the intended effect is a dramatic slightly stark blend of American and Belgian styles with a twist of Imperial India. If that was the intention.

Who knows and, really, who cares? Do I fret about such twists and turns of fashion? Not I. The beer pours aged pine beer under rich frothy white foam. On the nose there is icing sugar, sweet florals and lychee. That is all there in the mouth as well a strong waxy mentholated pine hoppy-ness that stands out without making a great statement. Yet. You can tell that the Belgian yeast and malt is reaching out to it but they have not come to terms. There is cream to the body but those hops are still a bit of a sore thumb. There is hope. Maybe. If it gets it stuff together. A gawky teen of a beer.

Only muted and short sighted BAer respect. This beer would do well having a couple of months in the cold, damp and dark to take the edge of the hops. Sorry, Stan. If this was considered ready to go, maybe we have to remember that the brewer's intention is not in the drinker's best interest.