The ABV Atlas

Where the Minotaur is pure muscle, the Manticore represents something craftier and fiercer – the body of a lion, the tail of a scorpion, and a mouthful of teeth. In this case, it's not just size that's the threat, but concealment. Beers between 7.0 and 7.9% ABV often prove to be the most seductive exactly where they're the strongest: sweet, fruity, warming, and smooth right up until the tail swishes. This is the range that catches people off guard.

The heart of "imperial" territory

Beers from the mid-to-high 7% range offer one of the best grounds for many of the craft beers' most revered big styles. This is the realm of the double and imperial IPA in its true form – an overpowering, resinous and tropical wall of hops supported by a solid malt base. Also very good are the Belgian tripels: deceivingly light in appearance, but with an assertive spice, carbonation, and great strength masked by a dry finish. Also, there are the robust strong ales, heavy stouts and porters, and warming Belgian strongs.

Subtleties of strength

This is the great challenge, and the great fun, of the band — smoothness. With almost 8% alcohol, there is no hiding the strength: hot, solvent, sharp. But the very best Manticores harness it fully, incorporating all that force into the fruits and sweetness of malt and hops, such that the beer is much lighter in character than its ABV. This is the magic of the tripel: it is so smooth and easy to drink that the beergoer is regularly taken by surprise by its higher alcohol content than most wines. It is a deceptive magic: this is a great beer.

One beer for an entire evening

At this point a single beer is really and truly a serving of beer in the full meaning of the word, one that can be poured and sipped slowly as it evolves. An exemplary 7.5% double IPA or tripel is a single serving beer in its own right, best consumed young and slowly. It is in the Manticores that beer truly becomes a powerful event, the stage at which the Atlas builds itself up for the true giants of the teens.

Below is whatever Hop Horizons has logged in the 7.0–7.9% range, ranked and broken down strength by strength.