* John I. Haas & Hop Head Farms
* Advanced forms and functions
* Fresh hops: The science
* Fresh hops: The controversy (?)
* Hop profile: Over/underrated
Welcome to Vol. 9, No. 5. In the introduction to “For the Love of Hops,” sixth-generation hop farmer Alex Feiner told me, “They say whoever is scratched by the hops cannot escape them.” That was apparent, once again, earlier this month when Daria and I visited farms in Oregon and Washington. Harvest signals an end, but also that a new brewing season is ahead. It might not make sense – after three years of acreage reduction and looking at a beer market that is not flashing green – but it seemed as if you could smell optimism as well as fresh hops in the kilns.
Of course, industry change is also always in the air. Today, John I. Haas and Hop Head Farms in Michigan announced that beginning Nov. 1 Haas will take over fulfillment of Hop Head’s existing contracts and customer relationships for non-Michigan grown hops. Hop Head will continue to farm and sell direct to market Michigan grown hops. Haas also announced a partnership with warehouse and logistics provider Lineage to operate a dedicated East Coast distribution hub in Pennsylvania.
What hasn’t changed is witnessing how exciting harvest is for brewers, particularly those experiencing it for the first time. We were gone by the time Michael James Jackson Foundation awardees arrived in the Yakima Valley, but Breeze Galindo captured a bit of it. And a story in the Yakima Herald-Republic adds perspective. (This version, with photos, appeared in the Seattle Times, and fortunately does not reside behind a paywall.)
BACK TO BASICS
Established in 2012, Hop Head Farms began selling hops grown elsewhere as well as its own almost from the beginning. It contracted with four German hop growers in 2013 to deliver bales of newly released varieties, such as Huell Melon and Mandarina Bavaria. As its own acreage expanded, so did relationships with growers elsewhere. Their spot hops catalog, including varieties supplied by Haas, illustrates how wide the range of what they offered became. That is changing.
“The future is growing our Michigan varieties, producing great hops,” Hop Head CEO Perry Veith said last week while visiting company farms. Yields this season were outstanding across the board, and he sounded optimistic. “I think the cycle is close to turning,” he said. Hop Head harvested “a couple of hundred acres” in 2025, and has room to expand.
“We’ve been partnering with Hop Head for close to a decade now, and I think this is just that natural next step,” said Haas CEO Tom Davis. “The market’s dictating a lot of it. Everyone’s feeling the pinch, whether it’s the brewer side, and certainly the grower side, and the distributors in between. The natural next step . . . is to do what you do best, and I think Hop Head does an excellent job. They’re the best in Michigan hops.”
The changes give Haas a larger footprint east of the Mississippi. “We’re going to be working more closely with these new customers, these new brewers,” Davis said. “Utilizing our East Coast distribution center will help because we’ll be able to get those hops out to those customers, as well as other brewers, much faster. Further penetration into the smaller craft brewers is an excellent part of the story from the Haas side.”
Initially focused on pellets, the facility will support a broader range of Haas products in the future. Brewers may expect more details in the coming months.
NEW FORMS, ENHANCED FUNCTIONS
On the second Monday of September, John I. Haas introduced LupoCORE, an enhanced pellet. One week later at drinktec in Munich, BarthHaas rolled out Prysma, a hop-derived concentrated flowable that is meant to be used throughout the brewing process, primarily from whirlpool to post filtration.
The sensory team at Haas assessing hops from the 2025 harvest.
* LupoCORE combines Sensory Plus selected hops and cold pellet processing. Briefly, Sensory Plus is a four-step process: 1) raw material screening, 2) profiling, 3) product-specific lot selection, and 4) brewing validation. The goal is to ensure consistency for both the chemical and sensory profiles of each hop variety, and to challenge the belief that access to premium hops is only for those who visit the Northwest for selection.
You’ll find more details, including geek-standard illustrations, here.
Cold processing removes the course fraction of hops and represents ongoing refinement of pelleting technology that has taken place since T-45 pellets were introduced in the 1980s. Those pellets are concentrated, as are more recent cold-processed products such as YCH Cryo, Crosby GGX and Haas Lupomax. LupoCORE is designed as a one-for-one replacement for T-90s, but with less beer loss and more intense aroma.
Available varieties include Amarillo, Azacca, BRU-1, Cascade, Centennial, Citra, Columbus, Dolcita, Ekuanot, El Dorado, Krush, Mosaic, and Sabro. More are expected.
* A white paper made available along with the Prysma announcement focuses on the emulsification technology involved in making the product, foregoing the need for non-hop derived emulsifiers, carriers or solvents. In the interest of keeping it short here, I suggest watching the video and requesting the white paper.
Although Prysma was designed with late and later hop additions in mind, smart money is on some brewers experimenting with using it from the beginning to the end. Available varieties include Cascade, Citra, Dolcita, Eclipse, Galaxy, Krush, Lublin, Mosaic, Spalter Selects and Tango.
A FRESH LOOK AT FRESH HOPS
The consumer participation component of “Drink Beer For Science” appears as if it is/was fun, but I’m more interested in what a lab at Oregon State University has to report and what trained sensory panelists have to say when the project is complete.
As Jeff Alworth at Beervana explained: The research question is: “Do fresh hop beers have a different chemical composition that is appreciable to tasters, and if so, what are they?” Four breweries are participating, and each one made two identical versions of the same beer. One version was made with Coleman Ag fresh hops, one with hops taken from the same field, but dried conventionally. In each case, only that one variable was different, meaning that if anything is different in the two beers, we can chalk it up to the fresh hops.
However, because other variables may affect the way fresh hops express themselves, each brewery has made a slightly different couplet of beers. Two breweries used Centennial hops, two Strata hops. One using each of those hops will use the fresh hops in the whirlpool, with hot wort, and one each will use them as a dry-hop addition in cold beer. So, if the brewing method or hop variety is a factor in this equation, we’ll have a better chance of identifying it by looking at the two beers from each brewery and comparing them all.
I’m excited to see this finally happening. When I was researching “For the Love of Hops” this was a fact: “This is not a scientific exploration of brewing. Where’s the economic benefit of analyzing a beer made once a year,” said Ninkasi founder Jamie Floyd.
WITH APOLOGIES TO TOM PETTY
Our first stop in Washington was Sept. 6 at Varietal Beer Co. There were three beers with green cones beside their names on the menu board behind the bar, signaling they were made with freshly picked hops. All were excellent, and Sesh Fresh, made with Amarillo hops direct from nearby Loza Farms, stood out. It smelled liked a recently laid kiln, and delivered a combination of fruity flavors, including watermelon. None of the three beers were brewed exclusively with fresh, or wet, hops. (A quick note: regular readers know I try to stay away from the fresh/wet debate by sticking to the words kilned and unkilned).
That same day, Cloudburst Brewing posted this message on Instagram:
“Dearest Wet Heads and Fresh Friends, Freshie Chasers and Wet Whistlers, we hear your screams of excitement and see your passionate questions about all things wet/fresh hops. AND WE FUCKING LOVE IT.
“That said, we are hoping you have your patient pants on. Here’s the deal: When we make these beers, we use the fresh hops (kilned loose cones) and wet hops (unkilned green cones) on the “Hot Side” – I.e. we add them on the brew day, to the grant and kettle and whirlpool, with the biggest charge being our mash tun converted hop back. This is the best way to utilize these hops – from flavor to texture to complexity to longevity – and there’s no debate. This means our wet/fresh hop beers take 24-26 days from brew to package (just like our regular IPAs).
“Some breweries (more and more, why god why?!) will make fresh/wet hop beers by conditioning finished beer on these hop cones for a few days (with no fresh/wet hops used on the brew day) and then release these beers as Fresh/Wet Hop IPAs. This is a process called “Cold Side” and it’s why you see these beers out so quickly in the market after seeing farm/hop pics. To us, this is cutting corners, and does not result in the truest examples of the style. Yes, some of these beers taste awesome, but even those ones fade faster/drop off quickly while they crowd taps and shelves.
“That said, we understand why so many breweries feel the pressure to get these beers out early. In a time when beer (as an industry) is down, capitalizing on drinkers’ excitement for this style and delivering while the anticipation is high makes sense (& dollars). So we get it! But, Cloudburst is gonna Cloudburst, and we aren’t gonna play that game.
“Ok that’s enough perceived fighting words to colleagues we call friends and loved ones (we still love you!) BUT we think it’s important to clarify the distinction.
“On to the important info! We have 9 WET/FRESH HOP BEERS planned for this season, plus an additional 2 collabs away, and we promise: great beers come to those who wait. Thank you for your passion and also your patience.”
A few days later, Varietal added this to the mix on Instagram:
“Hiya Friends and Beer Fans! As you are all aware, in the Yakima Valley we are in the middle of hop harvest and this years crop is looking, smelling and tasting fantastic! We’ve been busy adding these tiny, fresh gems to our beers as they come off the picker!
“We wanted to weigh in and correct some misinformation that has been spread recently, some breweries have been confusing opinions with facts. Fresh Hop and Wet Hop beers can be made in a variety of ways, there is, in fact, no correct way to make them or enjoy them! Our motto is ‘Drink what you like!’
“Adding fresh, wet cones to finished beer, otherwise known as a ‘Cold Side Fresh Hop,”, is one of the best ways a person can enjoy the peak freshness of the hop flower! The flavors are bright, fruity and add a pleasant ‘agua Fresca’ quality to the beer. These beers are best consumed very fresh as the qualities which make them exciting and different, are fleeting.
“Using fresh wet cones during the brew, or ‘Hot Side’ gives a different quality, accessing more of the oils of the hop cones and getting a deeper, more resinous character. These beers take 2-3 weeks to finish but the reward is worth it!
“Additionally, some breweries who don’t have the quick access to freshly picked hops we enjoy in Hop Country get hops that have been kilned off the cooling room floor and add them to their beers, both hot and cold side.
“We believe that it is a great privilege to have such unparalleled access to fresh hops as they are being harvested and it would be irresponsible to not explore every possible, delicious way beers can showcase the incredible work our farmers, farm workers, and hop processors put in during this season.
“So here’s to Crop Year 2025, to the beer bars, hop farms and farmers, field hands, brewers and all the fans of Fresh Hop, ‘Drink What You Like! We’ll Make What You Like!’”
The day following that post, I spent a little time in the morning at Cloudburst (and may have shown up on Instagram dipping a bag of hops in the brewery’s oversized grant for what amounted to a first wort addition). Among other things, Cloudburst owner/brewery Steve Luke and I talked about poorly made fresh/wet hop beers. (Again, I like kilned/unkilned, but fresh/wet has become a brand, and I am not fighting that.)
I tasted plenty of grassy, chlorophyll bombs when we lived in New Mexico and then St. Louis. It makes it easy to understand why Luke is concerned about protecting what has become, particularly in the Northwest, a brand. But, then, I sure did enjoy Varietal’s Sesh Fresh.
UNDERRATED? OVERRATED? SIGH
I had planned to profile Columbus this month, but that story, heritage included, demands a lot of space. And, as you may have noticed, this dispatch is a bit long. Instead, I’m pointing you to this article (a listicle, hence the sigh) that polls brewers about overrated and underrated hop varieties. I knew when I saw the headline that Citra and Mosaic would be there among the overrated. But I was delighted to see Crystal and Sterling get a little love.
And there was a tip of the cone to Chinook, a drum always worth beating, in Jared Rouben’s comment about how Columbus is overrated. I’ll be writing about Columbus next month anyway.
In the meantime, if you’d like to nominate a most underrated hop (overrated doesn’t interest me as much), hit reply or write [email protected]