Windmills
Maui Brewing Co.

I will be the first to say that I find Maui to be a very, very underrated brewery. I have enjoyed most of their output and find their coconut porter to be perhaps the best example of the very specific sub-sub-style it attempts, all while making absolutely no fuss and finding no hype for their great brews. These guys do awesome stuff and get no credit, in other words, and I'm about to sing their praises once again, as this is quite a nice NEIPA from, well, the total opposite side of the US. Kāmau!

Windmills pours a nice medium-orange color with a good haze that isn't 100% opaque or turbid, and the head is a strong finger-and-a-half that eventually sinks down to about a half-finger after five or so minutes in my glass, leaving behind some nice lace that leaves behind drippy patterns as it appears. Love the consistently hazy (but not overly-solid) body appearance here, and the hue is nice.

Alright, so this claims to solely feature New Zealand hops, which the brewery lists as "including Nelson Sauvin, Motueka, Pacific Gem, and Southern Cross." Great lineup, pretty much running the gamut of NZ hop varietals. I don't see Pacific Gem or Southern Cross used a lot, but the former seems to be blackcurrant/peppery/spicy, while the latter has light lemon and pine notes to it. Interesting. My first impressions of the scent here are that this is very piquant and spicy with a strong lemon/grapefruit essence element with some light earthy, woody notes. Sounds about right given what they used for hops, and really lends some uniqueness to the whole thing. That said, it's not a super apparent or strong scent, so perhaps a bit more dry-hopping would be useful.

Flavor has a solid amount of that crisp, juicy, white-wine-like Nelson goodness combining with the similarly-bright Motueka in a very appreciable way. It's not too much by any means, but these hops require some level-headedness in order to play together well, and Maui Brewing does a good job keeping them from stepping on one another. The malt bill is kinda snappy and works well with the hops here... I really like the light white pepper flavors (probably from the Pacific Gem?) when contrasted with the fruity and dense Nelson stuff happening. This is a good example of a well-done NEIPA that utilizes some unknown/underrated hops with some "flavor-of-the-week" varietals to make the whole beer much better with everything working in concert. I really like this brewery, they kick ass, and you're missing out if you're sleeping on them.