Who’s the hoppiest of them all? Taste for yourself and see if your palate aligns with the professional judges as the Los Angeles IPA Festival invades Mohawk Bend for its 4th year.

60+ California breweries will have beers pouring starting Saturday, March 4, and continuing to Sunday, March 5. Before hopheads arrive, the first set of judges will sample the beers and weigh judgment. Then the fans will take their turn. Once the votes are counted, the first winner will be announced at 4pm and then the People’s Choice victor will be revealed one hour later.

Last year, Highland Park Brewery went Bonkers IPA to dethrone two-time winner Noble Ale Works with Eagle Rock Brewery taking home the People’s Choice. With L.A. breweries taking home prizes at the recently concluded San Francisco Beer Week – DIPA Festival, you can be sure that the competition will be fierce.

This is a busy and crowded event, so prepare yourself. Or do as I do and show up the next day. You can start with flights as early as 9:30am! Some kegs will have kicked on Saturday, but there will be more than enough IPAs, DIPAs and bigger to choose from with flights for $13.50.

Check out the brewery list HERE. Then prepare to get bitter.

The BEER OF THE WEEK celebrates all the moisture that we has fallen upon us recently. Pacific Rain from Oregon’s Ninkasi Brewing is not your typical Pale Ale. You are not going to be floored by hops. This is almost ESB’ish in its quirky drinkability. Lots of grain flavor here. Plus the water used for brewing was touched by lava!

This week’s HOMEWORK is all about adjectives and adverbs. Beer Tasting Mastery has created a PDF with descriptive words that you can use when you are at a loss for words about the glass of beer that is front of you. From aroma, to mouthfeel, malts to yeast this cheat sheet will help you grow your craft beer vocabulary. You can have the hop section handy when you taste the beers at the L.A. IPA Fest to sound much more learned.

Find more of Sean Inman’s writing on his blog, Beer Search Party.