7.5

Appearance - 6 | Aroma - 7 | Flavor - 8 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 8

330ml bottle from a Tokyo station bottle shop. Poured a hazy golden orange colour with a frothy, white head. The aroma is malt, tropical citrus fruits, lychee, light woody hop. The flavour is moderate bitter sweet, with a crisp, fresh, tangerine, mango citrus hop, light spicy palate and a long bitter finish. Medium bodied with average to soft carbonation.

7.9

Appearance - 5 | Aroma - 9 | Flavor - 8 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 8

Bottle shared. Very cloudy golden with a white head. Aroma of tropical fruits, big lychee, peach, mango and tangerine. Flavour is moderate sweet and bitter. Medium bodied with soft carbonation.

6

Sweet

6.8

Appearance - 6 | Aroma - 7 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 6 | Overall - 7

Bottle (thanks jinroh). Pours hazy golden. Aroma is fruits, pineapple, citrus. Flavor is sweet and bitter, fruits, citrus, pineapple. Finish is sweet and hoppy. Overall: ok.

8.5

Appearance - 6 | Aroma - 8 | Flavor - 9 | Texture - 10 | Overall - 9

Pours murky orange-yellow. NE IPA’s are not really about the looks. Nose is lightly hoppy, tons of fruits there, mango, melon, pear and something greener too. Tastes super juicy, great balance and no weird rough off-flavorus that I tend to feel when I drink other NE IPA attempts in Japan. Fruity sweetness there as well, can feel it but still nicely balanced with some bitterness (which in itself is in background). Really good one, till now the best Japanese NE IPA specimen that I have tried.

7.8

Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 8 | Flavor - 8 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 7

Ise Kadoya x Culmination Brewing New England IPA Neko Nihiki 8%

Bottle from Rakuten. This is probably the beer that has generated the most rave reviews in the last 2 years in Japan and as such is ridiculously hard to find on tap or in bottles. Paler in color than the Shiga Kogen beer, it’s a murky gold with a foamy head that isn’t quite as thick as New Engi-land. The aroma is similarly juicy but sweeter with a strawberry accented tropical bouquet. Medium bodied, sharply carbonated with woodsy tropical fruit notes and perhaps more perceived bitterness.

It definitely grows on me and is very tasty but Shiga’s take hit the spot a bit more for me. The other advantages are it is more widely available and cheaper to boot! It’s possible that Shiga got better from the bottle and Neko Nihiki did not. Both are top quality IPAs worth trying. Then again it could be the fulsome praise had me expecting more.

8.4

Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 8 | Flavor - 8 | Texture - 10 | Overall - 8.5

Flawless integrated backbone, very smooth with tons of white peach, melon, oats. Well balanced perfectly executed. Love this stuff

8

Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 8 | Flavor - 8 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 8

Tap at Bungalow. Super cloudy pastel gold. Huge fruit nose, papaya, passion fruit, and orange. Enormous juice. Tropical and citrus juice flavor, peppery, tingly finish. Awesome NE style IPA, more dialed into the style than the last one.