Hill Farmstead (2019)

Haha yup. And especially now that Shaun is part of Freestyle farms in New Zealand. I’d expect the quality of the NZ Hops they get to be better than ever. There was so much horrible Nelson there for a few years. While being the most expensive and hardest to get hop (well next to Riwaka) it also seems to have the most variance. It can be straight grass/diesel fuel.

Agreed here too. I think last summer was the first time I had S&S6. It was on for fills and I typically don’t love Mosaic but the girl filling my other growlers told me I had to try a sample. Wow, hands down the best Mosaic I’d tasted up to that point. All the awesome aspects of Mosaic without the BO/sweaty feet/garlic shit you get in so many Mosaic beers. I think Toppling Goliath does an awesome job with their Mosaic focused beers too, Sosus and Pompeii rarely have the typical Mosaic stank. Not only do they get good lots but I have a hunch they do some process variable different to get the best out of that hop.

I know in 2017 or 2018 they made a big deal about really trying to source better lots of each hop. There was a lot of really bad Citra and Mosaic there for a while when production of those hops went through the roof.

 

Look at you guys, everyone getting along and agreeing. Where's the bait and switch guy? This much happiness is too much for a New England beer thread. LOL just kidding! I love HF Ipas as well.

 

Hill Farmstead is terrible.

 

ISO the bait and tackle guy instead

 

This weeks reading is quite strong:

 

DOUBLE RIWAKA!!

 

Have you ever seen such a beer? I don't think I have.

 

There has got to be some good fishing somewhere in the northeast kingdom.

 

Not sure the extent of sarcasm here but...

There aren’t too many breweries in the US to even use this hop. It’s so hard to grow and all the NZ breweries get to gobble up what little of it that actually gets harvested.

Supposedly it’s Shaun’s favorite hop and for a while I think he was the only US brewery to have a contract for it.

Up until this year the only breweries I know of off hand that even told people the used it was HF and Cellarmaker. It’s the hardest to source and often most expensive hop on the planet. When it’s good it’s unreal. For me it intense grapefruit but different than the grapefruit you get from OR/WA hops.... if anyone’s holding....

 

Good thing BA doesn't have a whoosh cop

 

Hill might be the first to source this hop alone with the extended ABV, so curiosity is apparent. Nonetheless, it's been accustomed to other mediums with Monkish, OH, Roundabout, Twin Elephant, Cellarmaker/Others

 

No sarcasm- I have never seen it as a singularly hopped beer-I am interested!

 

+ that fresh Helles - more icing for the wallet

 

Drinking Daylily from Fox Farm right now and it has “Southern hemisphere hops”. I wonder if Riwaka is one. Never heard if it tbh, usually it means nelson or galaxy

 

Doubt it. Unless you have a contract with Freestyle it’s virtually impossible to source. Last year I think there were between 20 and 30 breweries and this year they opened it up
to a few more. Could be wrong though. And even ones that could “contract” it don’t get squat.

There are piles of “Southern Hemisphere” hops. Lots of good ones only a handful of great ones. Although expect to see more and more beers with southern hemisphere hops and from the sounds of it better quality ones at that.

Sounds like the southern hops in Day Lilly are Galaxy/Vic Secret with some US hops blended in.

 

I know this probably gets asked far too often in this thread and I apologize if so, but: any rough estimates on how long Flora will last? Two weeks, maybe? Less? I know it depends on a variety of factors.

 

*Should* last the retail week, if not longer. 3pp is a pretty good indicator it’s a big batch.

Batch seven lasted almost a month, and that was 3pp as well.

 

I’ll be there in two Fridays (for the first time!). Fingers crossed.

 

saw this was on tap at Armsby recently. Been really wanting to try this one, but missed it this time. I'll echo others where I was not initially a huge fan of Mosaic, but I think it was largely due to crop quality. Used to be all metallic and oniony to me, but in the past year or so I've really enjoyed some mosaic forward beers, namely the 2018 Lagunitas Born Yesterday, Notch's Hang the DJ, and possibly my favorite DIPA, TG's SOSUS.

Also, I was going to say don't forget Harlan when discussing single-hopped HF beers, but their site now says it's dry-hopped with Columbus, Nelson, and Simcoe. For some reason I thought that was a Columbus-only beer.