I just finished my first Kiwi Rising, quite the excellent and fresh IPL offering. I was surprised to find a 105 IBU designation after drinking it; the New Zealand hops tend to exhibit a spicy, pungent, warm character to me more than straight up bitterness. Do aroma hops contribute highly to the IBU rating? Before anyone diagnoses me with Lupulin Threshold Shift...I haven't had any IPA or pale ales in three weeks...recently I've only had my Mad Elf case, Rumpkin, and Backwoods Bastard. None of them have a considerable bitterness rating or character. How do other Kiwi drinkers feel about this rating?
Aroma hops offer very little in terms of IBUs. IF you add hops early enough to get high utilization of IBUs you 'burn off' the aromas and flavor. If you add hops a little later you can save flavor but still 'burn off' aroma and decrease the IBUs picked up. If you add them at the very end of the boil or in the whirlpool or dry hop, you get aroma at the expense of flavor and IBUs. With all that said... I've never had Kiwi Rising
One can find many NZ hops with high AA, >10%, that are good for bittering as well as aroma. Look for dual purpose in the NZ lists here. https://www.hopunion.com/hop-varieties/
The Rising part of Kiwi Rising was named because each hop addition we made was larger than the previous one. So we used a lot of hops for bittereing but even more for aroma and flavor. Here is a picture I took last year of some of hop boxes...you can see the AA on several of the varieties.
I had my first Kiwi Rising yesterday. Delicious. Can't wait to check it out again. Incredible amount of flavor in the beer.
