Ransack the Universe Hemisphere IPA

Ransack the Universe Hemisphere IPA is born and bred in Hamilton, Ontario. Its proud parent is Collective Arts Brewing Ltd., and it's housed in 473mL cans with a variety of cool artistic expressions--mine had a stylized severed hand clutching a diamond over a body of water. At 6.8%, Ransack is pretty close to the median strength for an India Pale Ale. According to the can, the hops used in this little number come from Washington's Yakima Valley and from Victoria, Australia: Mosaic and Galaxy respectively.

Ransack pours a hazy, swampy orange gold, and it comes equipped with a durable, sudsy cream head. To my sniffer, the scent was quite mild, though there were suggestions of juicy citrus and sticky resin. The taste proved considerably fuller than the aroma, but walked the same line: juicy fruit and dank hops.

Not the bitterest IPA on the shelf, Ransack prefers to offer its drinkers a lush, tropical fruit salad of flavours backed a modest but steady hops presence. The result is a fresh and fun Ontario ale. It doesn't quite have the depth I wanted, but it's definitely an enjoyable product--one that's sure to bring me back to the well from time to time.

Rating: 8.0 out of 10.