The Brew Kettle White Rajah IPA

Beer Name: White Rajah IPA
Brewery: The Brew Kettle (Cleveland, OH)
ABV: 6.8%
How sold: 6-packs of 12 oz. bottles; 22 oz. bottles, or on draft
Where bought: N.W.I.P.A. (Portland, OR)****
Price: $6 for pint

**** = As part of PDX Beer Week, Portland again got access to some beers the city normally does not see. White Rajah IPA is one of those beers.

Date Purchased: June 20, 2015
Date Opened/Drank: June 20, 2015
When brewed? Year-round beer
IBUs: 70

Where distributed: The Brew Kettle only regularly distributes to Ohio and Kentucky as of mid-May 2015. As noted above, this was a special, one-time shipment to Oregon as part of PDX Beer Week. N.W.I.P.A. also got the ONLY keg of White Rajah IPA for PDX Beer Week. It is unknown as to whether more kegs or bottles will be shipped to Portland in the future.

What's on the Website: "A West Coast style IPA full of citrus-like and tropical fruit like hop flavor and aroma with an assertive yet smooth bitter finish....malt, take a back seat please." Click here for more on #WhiteRajah!

REVIEW:

Appearance (5%): Poured a clear orange-amber color with lots of carbonation and a few millimeters of foamy white head. The head then reduced to a sudsy surface. Exceptional. 4.75/5

Smell (25%): Incredible citrus-grapefruit and tropical aroma. Definitely West Coast IPA here. Reminds me of Pliny the Elder. So inviting. 5/5

Taste (40%): Very hop-forward, yet incredibly refreshing. Detected grapefruit. A controlled bitter finish. Absolutely knocked this out of the park. Like a Pliny clone but not as much ABV. 5/5

Mouthfeel (10%): Medium-light body. Extremely refreshing. Tiny bubbles tickle the tongue. Bitterness is controlled and lingers in a pleasant way. Would drink this all day during summer. 4.5/5

Overall (20%): A world-class IPA. I had not even heard of this beer until about three months ago, when White Rajah won a blind taste test -- yes, this was #1 -- out of 116 IPAs (only single IPAs). Although The Brew Kettle only ships to TWO states as of this blog post, I was beyond thrilled then N.W.I.P.A. scored a keg of this for PDX Beer Week. Knock another IPA to try off the bucket list. I might not get to try this again for a while, and I'm so glad I did. Our distributor needs to strike a deal with The Brew Kettle, stat. 5/5

Final Weighted Rating: 4.938/5