Fresh Hop 2020

And financially.

 

Now I see why. I was hoping to pick some up tomorrow at the Beaverton location, but them and the NW location sold out within a few hours.

 

This Fort George Fresh IPA with strata is delicious. Grab this if you see it. Does anyone remember if FG changes hops in this as the season progresses or will thus be the only version?

 

Is it just me or are there a lot more Strata fresh hop beers this year than last? By my count, we've got them from Ex Novo, Upright, Breakside, Ft George and Ferment.

 

Strata has really blown up in the last 2 years. A lot more acres of it being grown locally, especially at Goschie Farms, so more fresh hops to go around this year. It's hard for me to think of another new hop varietal from the last few years that's caught on as quickly as Strata.

 

Was beginning to wonder the same. Jeff Alworth pointed out in a recent blog post that Strata is an early harvest hop, so that’s why so many Strata beers at the moment. Looking forward to moving past Strata.

 

I was about to ask the same thing. I'm seeing a few Strata FH beers in the works in CA as well.

Hope all of you are safe right now.

 

Oooooh.... this means there’s much more to come!

 

I'm gonna agree with the folks who were not impressed by Pert Near. It's not a bad beer; it's just nothing special and seems a waste of fresh hops. I don't even think it's an IPA, it strikes me more as a pretty average pale ale. Mine was canned 8/25/2020—I have to wonder if the hops were just picked prematurely. I'm thinking "Smitty" Smith at Bale Breaker might have been right in @heyhiggi's post above about timing your harvest.

Still, I'm thrilled we are finally in fresh hop season and look forward to many better brews going forward. Cheers!

 

Loved La Cumbre's Altimeter a few years ago. I guessed it was Strata but never got an answer and I don't know if they ever made it again.

 

So much better than Pert Near. It's good.

 

I wouldn't think that the hop growers would allow inferior product to leave their farm. It's not like Pert Near is significantly earlier than other beers, it's just that maybe the base recipe just isn't very good. With that said they make it every single year so someone must be buying a lot of it.

The bale breaker post was kind of weird to me in context with how fresh hop season actually works. Some hop varieties are just ready earlier than others.

 

I will say, the pressure to get product sold (especially at the premium, relative to the total energy expended, that fresh hops seem to demand) whether its ready or not is very real. I would imagine that the more accommodating and insistent of hop quality above all else the brewery is the better chance they have of crushing a wet hop brew. I can easily envision the scenario where an antsy brewer convinces a hop rancher to pull some rows a few days early to fit into a crowded brew schedule. After all, the customer is always right?

 

Well I’ve never had this beer before so I have nothing to compare it to. I guess I assume if a brewery pays a hop grower to pick hops on Tuesday, whether they’re ready to be picked or not, the grower will pick them. But I don’t really know how it works so I could well be wrong about that.

 

I wish Sunriver would do a better job in announcing that these are available. They pretty reliably post on Instagram, but I've seen nothing except "stay tuned".

 

Oh yeah. MUCH more.

Centennial, Hallertauer, and Strata seem to be the earliest varieties harvested. I think Cascade and Simcoe are up next. (Breakside just released Wanderlust IPA with Cascades, and Barley Brown's posted photos of their Simcoe hop haul for FH Pallet Jack last week.)

 

Just the Strata Fresh IPA, but they are doing a different FH IPA with Sterling, too. I think it’s going to be called Rock Paper Sterling.

Fremont has a draft only Idaho Gem hazy FH IPA on at the UBG right now. Grabbed a crowler for tomorrow.

 

There may be instances of the scenario you described, but everything I’ve heard from the brewery side is that the farmers are in control of their harvest dates. The amount of hops sold fresh is a small percentage of the overall harvest, so the farmer is going to pick his crop based on how it will show in the hundreds of bales used for year-round production and the fresh hops are a small diversion from that.