I was at a conference two and a half years
ago. The morning of the first day
of the conference was filled with a particularly long and grueling
meeting. When lunch finally rolled
around, I needed a break from the conference and a beverage, so I walked from
the convention center to a conveniently located bar.
While looking through the drink menu, I saw a
new beer from a local brewery that I had not seen before: Hop Rising by Squatters. I didn’t know anything about it, so I
ordered it.
When I first looked at the bottle, I was a bit
skeptical on whether I would like it or not. It was an Imperial IPA. I wasn’t much of a fan of the IPA style genre. My general impression at the time is
that too many PAs and IPAs are over C-hopped, too citrusy, too piney, and unbalanced.
To my wonderment and surprise, I loved this
beer. The first IPA that I really
liked. It’s a 9% beer with 75
IBUs. But the thing is, it isn’t
an overpowering flavor and isn’t the same-old IPA hops that everyone uses. It packs in Amarillo, Cascade and
Chinook.
Now its going to sound odd that I like this beer
with Chinook in it where as I didn’t much like Sierra Nevada’s Bigfoot 2012
with Chinook in it.
I had never had anything like this beer.
The Chinook in Hop Rising is not the dominate
hop flavor. The dominate flavor is
the Amarillo coming through with flowers, orange in citrus. Cascade comes in behind it and gives it
a kick of grapefruit. Finally, at
the tail-end and with much subtlety, comes in the Chinook with piney and resiny
flavors.
After drinking Hop Rising, I began trying a wide
variety of PAs, IPAs, IPA Extras, and IIPAs. It was a style that I had by-and-large ignored for
years. And finally I had found a
one that gave me a reason to begin exploring the style.
Hop Rising is a beer that inspires me as a
homebrewer because it expands my horizons and makes me think of new things that
I can try. Or ingredients that I
have frequently not liked, and found that it can be used in ways that I find pleasing.
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