Session # 139 | Kern River | Just Outstanding IPA | 6.8% ABV
American IPA | Kernville, California | Rating: 83/100
One year ago: De Struise Black Albert
Kern River Brewing is another one of those west coast breweries that is known for their IPAs. While they may not receive the same amount of attention that folks like Green Flash or Russian River might, you see their name quite a bit on the beer forums. In addition to this beer (which is called Just Outstanding IPA), they also produce the Citra Double IPA that many folks praise as one of the best in the style. Dry-hopped with Simcoe and Amarillo, Just Outstanding IPA poured a warm hazy orange with a very nice off-white head. The head had a nice consistency and gave a good amount of lacing, too. The aroma was very traditional with its light citrus and pine aromas. The bitterness is the first thing your palate focuses on upon taking the first sip. There was a good amount of malt sweetness that tends to make this lean a bit more to the Midwest end of IPAs. The citric and pine hop character in the mouth is so straight forward that I struggled to find something that truly stands out about this beer. Overall this beer is good (approaching very good), but not quite outstanding.
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This beer can be found in these states.
Listening To: Devendra Banhart “Brindo”
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Posted by Jon on February 2, 2011 at 1:52 PM
Definitely a more balanced IPA than what usually comes off the west coast. Citra is the same. Not my favorite, but a drinkable IPA.
Posted by thehopry on February 3, 2011 at 10:27 AM
Honestly Jon, I think it might have been a touch old. Not your fault at all… Just the primary reason breweries should put bottling dates on their beers.
Posted by Mike on February 3, 2011 at 6:05 PM
I just got a bottle in a trade recently and also thought mine was a touch old…it wasn’t nearly as good as the last time I was out in San Diego and had a fresh bottle.
BTW, very creative with Kern spelled on the fridge
Posted by thehopry on February 4, 2011 at 9:43 AM
Hahaha…thank you!
Posted by Jon on February 4, 2011 at 2:30 PM
Sorry to hear that. Picked it up from the brewery directly over Christmas and it had been sitting in the fridge ever since. Couldn’t tell you when it was bottled though.
Posted by thehopry on February 4, 2011 at 3:04 PM
Don’t apologize – it’s out of your control.
Posted by Jon on February 4, 2011 at 3:14 PM
I just hate sending bad IPAs for the exact reason that it doesn’t truly represent the beer. Kind of disappointed that the brewery would do this to themselves. I go to breweries for trade hoppy beers when I can because the beer should be as fresh as it is going to ever be.
Posted by Bobby Digital on February 3, 2011 at 8:52 PM
A while back I grabbed a box out of my stash to pack up some beers to ship off. As I was loading some of them up I found a Just Outstanding IPA that I received and never knew it. It was probably 2-3 months prior that I got it. I drank it and enjoyed it. Moral of the story; do a bad job of unpacking boxes from trades and you are left with a surprise down the road.
Posted by thehopry on February 4, 2011 at 9:43 AM
DOH! That sucks…
Posted by theReaper16 on February 6, 2011 at 11:30 PM
I’m sort of with you on this beer. I thought it was pretty solid, with an exceptional aroma.
Posted by Eric Giddens on February 13, 2011 at 12:06 PM
Trolling the internet and found this site; thought I might drop a line.
If the beer was picked up at the brewery around Christmas then it was likely bottled on Dec 14th unless there was poor rotation in the front beer fridge; still it is unlikely that the beer was much older since we go through it quickly here. We don’t date the bottles because we are a small brewpub and simply can’t afford that piece of equipment (we do date each case). As it is we label by hand; of course if anyone wants to volunteer to write the date on each bottle we would be happy to supply the sharpies.
With that said, if it came across as even a little sweet then it certainly doesn’t sound right since it is a very dry beer. It seems that effort was made to store it cold, so I can safely assume it was shipped cold. That leaves me wondering if it was a bad cap leading to oxidation… Hard to know for sure.
Anyway, just wanted to chime in. Thanks for trying the beer!
Eric Giddens
Kern River Brewing Company
Posted by thehopry on February 13, 2011 at 3:26 PM
Hi Eric –
Thank you for stopping by my site and (more importantly) for commenting.
It’s understandable that some breweries don’t have the funds to label their bottles specifically. However, I really feel that tagging them in any way is one of the most important things a brewery can do for its IPAs. These beers have such a short lifespan and can really benefit from doing so. I’m sure there are affordable ways to do this.
If you look at Pretty Things Beer & Ale Project out of Somerville, Massachusetts, for example, you can see that they put small labels over their caps that call out batch numbers and bottling dates. I think this is a great (and probably somewhat affordable) way to let the customer know when their beer was bottled.
Another alternative would be to place tiny stickers on the bottoms of the bottles while instructing consumers to go to your website to see what that sticker means. For example…yellow sticker was bottled on 1/14/11; blue sticker was bottled on 2/27/11; etc.
Finally, just want to make it clear that this beer was far from bad. I actually liked it quite a bit. Reviewing critically like I do, though, I had to give my honest assessment of the beer at that time. I could tell that it had been past its prime and probably would have been better four to six weeks earlier. If it was in fact bottled in mid-December, it’s perfectly logical that it would have lost a bit of its luster by early February.
Anyway, I look forward to trying more of your beers in the future and hope you’ll come back when I do.
Thanks
Mark Starr
Posted by James on May 2, 2011 at 11:15 AM
JO squarely sits in my top 10 beers of all time. I grab it whenever I get the chance.