A rather belated review of Ranger IPA

New Belgium Brewery is one of my favorite breweries. India Pale Ale is one of my favorite beer styles. So, you can image in the excitement I felt when on Feb. 2, the clerk at my local liquor store gave me a bottle of (the yet to hit the shelves) New Belgium Ranger IPA.
 
When you pour Ranger (really, people stop drinking beer out of the bottle), you notice that it’s really rather light for an IPA. It’s a light amber and pours a pretty good head. The hops lend a nice and light piney, green apple-y and grapefruity aroma, but it doesn’t knock your socks off.
 
This is a fairly well-balanced, and very easy-to-drink beer. It feels a litter thinner on the mouth than other IPAs out there, but the lends to it’s drinkability. The hop bitterness doesn’t hit you at first, instead it lingers until after you’ve swallowed. The first tastes result in a light caramel sweetness, and then once the beer hits the back of your mouth, the hops pop out. The aftertaste? It’s all hops and it sticks around for quite some time. At 70 International Bittering Units, Ranger is at the high end for hoppiness – and that’s the way I like it. Although in allergy season (like now) that means a runny nose.
 
Ranger’s alcohol content weighs in at a respectable 6.5 percent.
 
I think it’s a bit on the dry side; I like my IPAs to be a bit sweeter and therefore a bit more malty, which is kind of odd coming from a Hop Head. But with the amount of hops in there, I can’t complain about much. 
 
The bottom line is if you like hops, and you like beer, you'll like Ranger.