Bottle from Furusato Nozei. Hazy orange amber with a high, fine head. Nose is caramel, toffee, butterscotch, pine, citrus hops. Sweet, butter caramel, orange and some pine. Old school, sweet and cloying, also very buttery. Bitter, slightly rough finish. Ok, but not as good as the other two, and a bit too late in the century for an IPA like this.

Bottle from Kyoto Lefty. Tosa IPA 6% A matte brass/copper color which isn’t attractive as it looks almost full brown. The think light beige foam that is pillowy and lasts is nice though. The aroma has classic west coast ipa hops but also caramel butterscotch. The taste is ok but also adds an almost metallic iodine thing but has a nice bready caramel biscuit in the finish which I like. A touch odd in an IPA but nice. These guys have issues but there are also a few nice points. Get some things dialed in and sort out those odd metallic/iodine flavors and they’d be on track. At the moment this is just a touch over the drinkable line for me.