Amplifier Hazy IPA by Dainton Brewery

This week we’re heading down to a favourite of the blog: Dainton Brewery in Melbourne.  This time it’s for their brilliant Amplifier Hazy IPA.

Dainton has been featured a fair bit on this blog for their funky beers (see Pickle Dan and B’easter Egg).  But Amplifier is a firm reminder that these guys aren’t just reliant on wacky out-there beers.  They just know how to make a really damn good beer.  In this case, it’s an absolutely spot on hazy IPA.

Amplifier is such a well-done beer.  And it helps that it’s exactly the kind of hazy IPA I like: IPA first, hazy second. It’s definitely got that softness and fuzziness you’d expect with a hazy.  But it’s not over the top with the juiciness.  Amplifier is first and foremost a hop-delivery vehicle.  Don’t get me wrong, this isn’t a kick-you-in-the-face hoppy beer.  This is a well-crafted, nuanced beer.  But the star of the show is definitely the hops.

And the hop profile here is just perfect.  It’s dry and it’s bitey. And the haziness is there to perfectly complement it. This is also a big beer. It comes in at 8.0% which, while not super-absurd in the IPA world, certainly packs a very respectable kick. But at no point does it taste like Dainton have taken it too far with the booziness. Everything about this beer works.

As you might guess from the name, everything about Amplifier is cranked up a couple of notches.  The hoppiness is certainly big, but the citrus peel haze comes right along with it.  I am very conscious that my last post was about objectively some of the best hazy IPA’s in the world (see Tree House).  But even having said that, Amplifier is one of the best hazy IPA’s, and one of the best beers I’ve had in a long time.  And the bit where it definitely beats out the Tree House beers, is you can definitely find it here in Australia.  And I highly recommend you do just that.