Mad River Brewing Company Double Dread Imperial Red Ale

Hello beer lovers and welcome to another edition of the NorCal Beer Blog's brew review.

Tonight’s featured beer is Mad River Brewing Company Double Dread Imperial Red Ale. I enjoy finding Mad River Brewing Company’s offerings and when I found this at Mission Liquors I knew I had to pick some up and try it.

Commercial Description (taken from RateBeer): “Part of our limited release high gravity series celebrating our twentieth anniversary (1989 to 2009) Double Dread Imperial Red (An American Strong Ale) is a high gravity red ale brewed with Two-Row Pale Malt, complimented by Aromatic and Wheat malts and a blend of CaraMunich, Carastan and Crystal malts for color, complexity and flavor. Fermented with our signature ale yeast, this hop bomb of a red ale is bittered with Colombus and Cascade hops, flavor and aromatics are enhanced by Cascade, Chinook and Amarillo, then generously dry-hopped with a tri-fecta of Cascade, Amarillo and Chinook for zesty citrus aromatics and a resinous flavor explosion. For those who chose to indulge their courtly passions be forwarned that this royal ruby refreshment ferments out at 8.6% a.b.v and nears triple digit IBU’s”

Let’s get started!

Appearance: Pours a deep reddish brown with a thick off-white head and excellent lacing.

Aroma: Sweet caramel and biscuit scents – powerfully malty with pine and citrus hops and an earthy tone…woodsy…

Taste: Sweet, roasted, pale and caramel malts. Lots of citrus and pine hop character. Hint of an earthy, spice and herb finish.

Overall: A solid and complex Imperial Red. Well balanced and extremely drinkable at 8.6% ABV this might be a short session, but well worth looking for when available.

Cheers!

Mark Harvey