New Belgium Ranger IPA - Beer of the Week

by Joshua M. Bernstein, Posted Mar 1st 2010 @ 4:00PM

For nearly two decades, Fort Collins, Colo.'s New Belgium Brewery has been a steady, flavorful force in the microbrew world, turning out beers as dependable as they are delicious. Sample the toasty Fat Tire amber ale, the crisp Blue Paddle pilsener or one of the palate-challenging, category-defying Lips of Faith releases, and you'll be as pleased as punch.

But for all of New Belgium's liquid ingenuity, and a penchant for being ahead of the curve, one beer category has been conspicuously absent: a bracing, bitter, American-style India Pale Ale.

"Since we tend to focus on Belgian beers, we hadn't done anything that was super-hoppy," says Bryan Simpson, New Belgium's director of media relations. "But anecdotally, we were hearing that there was a demand for us to do an IPA. We have a Belgian brewmaster, and he told us we're free to create what we want."

The result was the recently-released Ranger IPA, the brewery's latest addition to its year-round roster. "It surprised a lot of folks," Simpson says. It surprised me, too.

Ranger pours a gorgeous golden yellow, like the sun setting during magic hour, with a slow-dissipating head of foam. Thanks to a heap of Cascade, Chinook and Simcoe hops (70 IBUs), the nose is sweet, citrusy and positively pungent. But 6.5 percent ABV Ranger drinks easy and balanced ("a nice mix of treble and bass," Simpson says), packing a light, biscuity body and a great bite of grapefruit and pine resin.

Good things, it seems, come to those who wait.

Like the latest IPA? Hate it? Spill it in the comments.

Joshua M. Bernstein has written about brews, bars and booze for New York Magazine, Time Out New York, ForbesTraveler.com and the New York Times.

Filed Under: Drinks
Tags: belgian beer, BelgianBeer, New Belgium Brewery, New Belgium Ranger IPA