Calling all IPA lovers...what are your favorite 3?

Treehouse "Alter-Ego"

Two of my DIPA's
- "Storm Stalker" hops - x331, Idaho 7, Citra, and Amarillo
- "A Guy Named Steve" birthday beer for a friend. hops Citra, Mosaic, Motueka

My top-ranked IPAs include:
Tree House - Doppelgänger
Old Nation - M-43
Maine - Lunch or Another One

...but some more readily-available IPAs like Founders All Day, NEBCO Sea Hag, or Bells Two Hearted are pretty hard to beat.

1.Heady Topper
2.DFH 90
3.Sixpoint Puff

Trillium - DDH congress
Tree House - Green
Hill Farmstead - Double Galaxy
OH - DDH cabbage

wow, good question:
Bells - Hopslam
Surly - Abrasive Ale
Boulevard - Double Wide IPA <---- the reason for this is it's very consistent, always enjoyable, and never any complaints.

Madison River Brewing - Dropper
Midnight Sun Brewing - Hop Dog
Squatters - Hop Rising

DFH90
DuClaw Serum
Troegs Perpetual

Trillium DDH Congress Street
Hill Farmstead Conduct of Life
Pinthouse Pizza Electric Jellyfish

3Floyds - Zombie Dust
Alewerks Brewing - Bitter Valentine
Columbus Brewing - Bodhi

Great Notion, Urban Family, Block 15

Very interesting to see how this thread has evolved. Hard to name three, since there are sooo many good ones and ones we cant even get here

Lawson sos
Half acre deep space
Melvin drunken master

3 floyds Gumball Head

3 floyds zombie dust

And a local chapman brewery Undonted

Hop Drop N Roll (NoDa)

Bengali ipa (Six Point)

Hop Fiend ipa (Boojum)

Space Dust IPA (Elysian)

#Buzzwords Superdank (Half Door Brewing Co)

Ruination DIPA (Stone)

Youth Lagoon (Foam)

Green (Treehouse)

Haze (Treehouse)

1) Firestone Double Jack was my top by far... they don't make it any more
2) 120 minute is good, not really an IPA though. Fun for its uniqueness.
3) Space Dust is really good.

Most overrated is Pliny the Elder. Great beer, but overhyped.

@anotherbeerplease
As is heady topper......focal banger is much better offering from the Alchemist. Heady gets all the hype just for being the first

Noble J said:

@anotherbeerplease
As is heady topper......focal banger is much better offering from the Alchemist. Heady gets all the hype just for being the first

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I watched a youtube vid where Heady was blind tasted and rated mid to high but nowhere near #1. And then they found out it was "the best". Okay so it's not scientific but basically supports that the label (and scarcity) can affect taste perceptions.

Maine - Lunch
Tired Hands - Hop hands
Sweetwater - 420 ipa
Cigar City - Jai Alia

anotherbeerplease said:

I watched a youtube vid where Heady was blind tasted and rated mid to high but nowhere near #1. And then they found out it was "the best". Okay so it's not scientific but basically supports that the label (and scarcity) can affect taste perceptions.

Click to expand...

This is a very common phenomenon, perception affects reality. It can be seen with any number of things, not just beer. But if a person thinks that something should be good be excellent, either because they paid a lot, had to seek it out, there isn't a lot of it, or any other reason, they will perceive it to be much better than it might be. Doesn't make it less special to that person. Heady to me is special because it's the beer that made me not hate IPAs.

For the subject of the thread.
1. Lone Pine - Chaos Emeralds
2. Trillium - Any of the Dialed In series
3. The Alchemist - Focal Banger
There's a few Tree House that are right behind, but that Lone Pine blew me away, the dialed in is different in a great way, and the alchemist has more nostalgia for me than tree house.

Local AZ Breweries
1. Wilderness Brewing - Suit N TiePA
2. Mother Road Brewery - Tower Staion
3. McFate Brewing - Fatality

Distributed Nationwide
1. Ballast Point Grapefruit Sculpin
2. Deschutes Fresh Squeezed
3. NB Voodoo Ranger Imperial

I'll go Old School

Smuttynose Finestkind
90 Minute IPA
Heady Topper (Ok not so old school)

anotherbeerplease said:

I watched a youtube vid where Heady was blind tasted and rated mid to high but nowhere near #1. And then they found out it was "the best". Okay so it's not scientific but basically supports that the label (and scarcity) can affect taste perceptions.

Click to expand...

Yeah, that phenomenon is pretty well established. But some people want to think only other people are affected by things like scarcity and infamy. I for one am tempted to "prove" that the scarcity and infamy of Heady Topper does not influence my love for it by citing the fact that the same scarcity and lure surrounds Pliny the Elder, and I don't love that one. But, no, that's not the way it works. Bottom line: I love Heady. Don't know whether it's totally objective. Don't care.

anotherbeerplease said:

1) Firestone Double Jack was my top by far... they don't make it any more
2) 120 minute is good, not really an IPA though. Fun for its uniqueness.
3) Space Dust is really good.

Most overrated is Pliny the Elder. Great beer, but overhyped.

Click to expand...

I liked Pliny but never felt it was over-hyped. Pliny the Younger tho...

Sweetwater 420 G13
Stone IPA
Samuel Adams Rebel IPA

3 floyds zombie dust
42 north borderland
Nishamaney creek shape of hops to come.

Port Brewing Wipeout IPA

Stone IPA

My HB IPA

Deschutes Inversion IPA
PFreim IPA
Lagunitas IPA

Coronado Brewing Co Islander IPA

Ballast Point Unfiltered Sculpin

Stone (original) Ruination

New additions to my list...

San Tan Brewing - Moon Juice
Deshutes - Fresh Haze
Sierra Nevada - Hazy Little Thing

Ballentine India Pale Ale. The way they made it back in the '80's.

1) the one I'm drinking now.
2) the one I drank last.
3) the one I'm drinking next.

There are so many fantastic beers out now that it's hard to choose just 3, or 5 or 10 best.
I'm pretty lucky to be in a major craft beer (and IPA / NEIPA) center, with dozens of world-class breweries a short drive away, and hundreds more in that same radius (not world class, but the majority of them are brewing some great beers, maybe not IPAs though.)

pretty much my answer... "the last 3 I've had"

and we're also in a major craft beer center. our county has 42 wineries, 33 breweries, 3 cideries, 2 distilleries and a meadery

both our LHBS are Brew on Premise and we have the first US outpost of Delirium Cafe

jrgtr42 said:

1) the one I'm drinking now.
2) the one I drank last.
3) the one I'm drinking next.

There are so many fantastic beers out now that it's hard to choose just 3, or 5 or 10 best.
I'm pretty lucky to be in a major craft beer (and IPA / NEIPA) center, with dozens of world-class breweries a short drive away, and hundreds more in that same radius (not world class, but the majority of them are brewing some great beers, maybe not IPAs though.)

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1. Yellow Rose by Lone Pint
2. F-5 by Coop
3. the annual Celebration Ale by SN

1. Tesseract - Grimm
2. Haze - Treehouse
3. Surly this cant be IPA - Sand City

Honorable mentions
Other Half Space Diamonds, Dogfish Head 90 minute, Laguintas Little Sumpin Sumpin

It's not my favorite style, but I really like Bell's Two-Hearted, SN Celebration, and something I had from Flying Dog Brewery; I think it was "Double Dog" I think Bell's is my favorite.

Goose Island makes some good ones too, even if they are owned by Budweiser

Edit: I forgot about another really good one I had recently, St Arnold's "Art Car". So the list is

1. Bell's Two-Hearted
2. St Arnold's Art Car
3. SN Celebration

Man, its been a while since Ive dhelved into my favorite of faves.

But currently Stone beers are topping that list thus far.

The Stone Tangerine Express has been finding its way into my fridge quite consistently.
I just polished off the Stone MixPack (Delicious IPA, Ruination, IPA and Hop Revolver) - It was 'okay to good'
Im drinking a Heavy Seas Tropi Cannon now - definitely a one time purchase.

I think Im going to start back down the path of IPAdom again to see what my faves are (again)

My 3 favorite IPA's
Heavy Seas Loose Cannon
Bells Two Hearted
Ballast Point Sculpin
My 3 favorite DIPA's
Heavy Seas Double Canmon
Bells Hopslam
Russian River Pliney the Elder
My 2 favorite Triple IPA's
Dogfish Head 120min
Heavy Seas 23

1. Free
2. Cold
3. Plenty

I was just on a mission to find my favorite West Coast Style IPA to model a beer off, so I drank a good 18 different IPAs (plus a few more on draft). My top 3 were:

• Bear Republic Racer 5: Modeled my batch after this one...4 classic C-hops...wonderful light and flavorful malt bill!
• Bell's Two Hearted: It really is a solid grain bill, with some hops mixed with Centennial hops this would be crazy good.
• Smuttynose Finest Kind IPA: A sleeper pick that stood out to me.

My honorable mention goes to Lagunitas IPA. After a podcast talking about them mashing at 160F I was thinking this beer had to be crazy sweet...but it is a well balance beer...where a lot of IPAs are way to sweet/loaded with crystal.