Hops Hops Hops. We continue to talk about hops. Hop methods and hop varieties. We finally get down to tasting some hops. This week we quaff down some mighty fine double IPA loaded up with Australian and New Zealand Hops!

One of the best IIPAs we can get around here in the Northeast is Heady Topper out of Vermont. For kicks we tasted John’s double IPA along side Heady Topper. Why?!?! Because its good! Not intending to make a direct comparison recipe or flavor wise there are some technique and presentation lessons to be learned tasting your beer with a similar style side by side. It can help give you perspective in your beer. I find that if I have another fine example of the style I am working on it helps me see depth and difference more clearly than if I simply sampled my beer alone. For that matter, you should try purchasing two or three commercial examples of any style of beer. Tasting them side by side can be pretty eye opening.

Enough of that! John’s IPA was a a wonderful smooth bitterness to it up front. It wasn’t resinous or biting, just smooth and lent good balance to the malt bill. That bitterness was necessary to help support the caramel malt in the recipe as well. Certainly helped to balance the malt backbone of the beer.

John put most of is efforts late in the boil process and it shows. There is great hop aroma and flavor coming from the hops at this stage. The best way I could describe the down under hops was as dark or overipe fruit. The zing of the tart fresh fruit character was gone but the flavors are more deep almost enriched. These hops played nice together and work well as late kettle additions. Not over done, but strong enough to taste them and be drawn in after each sip.

In comparison to how Heady Topper comes across the technique yield some similar results. Heady is bright, crisp and clean. The hops are also present predominantly as flavor and aroma additions. Heady does have strong resin like quality that tends to long on the palate. Certainly characteristic of the American style and the American hops. Where in the Down Under IPA the hops down linger; they are not super resinous. An interesting aspect of these hops and maybe something play with if that’s how you like your IPAs.

Have you brewed with Down Under Hops? Tell us about it in the comment sections or on our YouTube channel along with the video.

BREW ON!