Arrangement WCIPA by Bracket Brewing (ft Kicks Brewing)

The next beer to feature on the blog during this Royal interlude is the absolutely brilliant Arrangement WCIPA from Bracket Brewing in collaboration with Kicks Brewing.

Now, I’m not going to bury the headline on this one. This may just be the best IPA I have ever had. It is at the very least in the conversation. Yes, I am aware of the magnitude of that statement and I don’t make it lightly. I have drunk more than my fair share of IPA’s in my time. I’ve had the world-renowned ones like Headdy Topper and Pliny. I’ve had lesser-known crackers like Heelch O Hops and Aussie classics like Pirate Life’s IIPA and Otherside‘s Headliner. But Arrangement WCIPA absolutely belongs in the conversation with all of them.

Obviously this comes with the usual caveat that my tastes may differ from yours and this is clearly a subjective call. But my goodness is it ever a brilliant beer.

At this point I’ll back it up a little bit. I had the good fortune to visit Bracket Brewing in their relatively new home in Marrickville. I have loved their beer for a long time and some of them like Huddle for Warmth have featured in the blog. Honestly, and this is another big call and with apologies to breweries like Mountain Culture, I reckon they are probably the best IPA brewery in Australia.

And that is a big reason that when my good mate Tristan was out from San Francisco for a visit, I proposed Bracket as a meeting point. Bracket is easily the most Californian Australian brewery I’ve been to in Australia.

I was waiting for Tristan to arrive so I grabbed a middy to tide me over without putting too much thought into the choice of beer. But from the very first sip it absolutely grabbed my attention.

Even before the first sip, the aroma grabs you. It’s pure, slightly resiny hops. It’s not one of the dank ones or the ones that smell like citrus fruit (although I definitely do like those as well). This smell is just pure hops. And the taste delivers on that. It perfectly highlights the hoppiness. But it’s still got a good body to it too. It’s not like one of those cold IPA’s or very light pale ales that, to be fair showcase the hops really well, but have nothing else going on. This is a complete beer. A complete beer built around hops. Have I mentioned it’s hoppy?

I realise my descriptive skills are probably letting me down a bit here, but the whole package just comes together in a brilliant IPA. It’s genuinely one of the best I’ve ever had, if not the best. And you may scoff at such a big claim. But if it’s something I’m even willing to throw out there, even if I’m off the mark, you can at least believe me that it’s a damn good beer.

Arrangement WCIPA is a collaboration with Kicks Brewing which is just down the road from Bracket in Sydney’s Inner West. I’ll admit I’m not very familiar with Kicks’ beer. But if they’ve contributed to this one, I’m definitely going to have to educate myself.

Tragically, this is a limited release beer. Even more tragic is that they are now sold out on the website. If you make it into the brewery, there’s an off chance it might still be on tap, but no guarantees unfortunately. So I do apologise for writing a blog post that essentially says ‘this beer is the best beer you’ll ever have….but you won’t be able to find it anywhere’.

But I will live in hope that Bracket and their buddies at Kicks bring the Arrangement WCIPA back. If it could be on as a core beer I would be over the moon. But I get that’s a long shot with collabs. So I’ll just have to content myself with hording my remaining two cans for a special occasion. And watching the Bracket (and Kicks) new releases in hope that Arrangement comes back one day.