Beer Around Town

Just in case you aren’t sick of hearing about hops this week, here is another thing on hops!

I was always to lazy for those single hop homebrew experiments. Brewing the same recipe with only the type of hop changing, then comparing each side by side, contrasting each hop’s uniqueness and persona.  A few breweries have taken up this task in place of my lack of effort, each one fun to try, but never produced close enough together to really get a side by side comparison like is truly needed. Along comes Mikkeller with their Single Hop Simcoe and Single Hop Warrior. I know, it’s only two, but that’s at least a start. One of the more interesting things about this choice of hops, both are primarily used as bittering hops, and these Single Hop beers seemed destined to showcase their aromatic and flavor characteristics. So this should give a nice glimpse into some hop flavors that might be lesser known.

Brewer background. Mikkeller is sort of a gypsy brewer(y), contract brewing here and there, mostly through Denmark and Belgium, producing some of the worlds best beer (at least in my opinion). These single hop series were brewed at De Proef brewery in  Belgium, each using a single style of hop to showcase it’s characteristics. The first two available to us are the Simcoe and Warrior, both relatively new strains hop hops. I dug around for a bit of info on these and here is what I fount from Yakima Chief who grows these:

Simcoe:

Simcoe® is a bittering/Aroma type cultivar bred by Yakima Chief Ranches. 12-14% Alpha Acids, 4-5% Beta Acids, Used for its aromatic and especially for its bittering properties due to its low cohumulone content properties.

Warrior:

Warrior® is a bittering hop of a recent origin, bred by Yakima Chief Ranches.15-17% Alpha Acids, 4.5-5.5% Beta Acids, Used both for its aromatic properties and especially for its bittering properties, due to its low cohumulone content.

I know the above summary is brief and Dr. Wort is probably going to get all fussy about it, but I wasn’t able to find a whole lot of info on these, especially when looking for their flavor characteristics, probably since they are more used as bittering hops, but if anyone can find some more on these from a good source I would be glad to update the descriptions.

Overall the base beer was nice and simple, really built to showcase the hops, but providing enough sweetness up front to keep these big alpha acid hops from being to sharp. They pour darker copper with a good sized off-white head, the Simcoe version seemed to have better head retention, but both did really well.

The Simcoe version shows a nice citrus and pine combo, fronted with a sweeter apricot note, and faint tropical fruit tones, maybe mango? The bitterness was more mellow then the Warrior. Overall I really enjoy the Simcoes, I think they give off a nice apricot sweetness that really compliments the malts well.

Next up was the Warrior version. Warriors seem to give a big tropical fruit note, spicy and floral, almost perfumy and bubblegummy. The nose on this reminds me of De Proef or Unibroue beers, like Belgian esters, and a bit like fresh ground coriander, also a touch woody. I’m not sure if Warrior hops created this flavor or if it is a cross contamination from the De Proef brewery, but I really enjoyed it. Very aromatic and unique, sort of reminds me a bit of jasmine also. The bitterness was noticeably stronger on this, a bit sharper in the finish. Really excellent overall, although I would have to do some experimenting to see if this was indeed the hops giving off this characteristic or a yeast strain.

In the end I sided towards the Warrior as my favorite. I’m excited for more of these to arrive on our shelves, hoping that by taking a bit more detailed notes then normal I can learn more about hop flavors.

Anyone else try these or have experience with these hops? I think the only time I have used either of these before was when I made a 3 Floyds Dreadnought clone about 5 years ago and used a few ounces of Simcoes.