It's Labor Day. Do You Know Where Your Fresh Hops Are?
These beauties are growing at Coleman Agriculture, from which I plucked this photo.
Each year, breweries get a jump on fresh hop season by grabbing the first hops of the harvest and dipping them in a tank of fermented beer for a few days. That has the advantage of speed, but tends to unnerve me, because I don’t want my fresh hop ales in mid-August. I want them as the creator intended, after Labor Day. So while I have seen and even tasted a fresh hop beer this year, only now do I consider it proper sipping season.
Thanks to increasing awareness of this seasonal specialty, more and more breweries around the country are starting to make them. It helps that other states now have small amounts of hop acreage—and given how hard it is to plug into the hop supply chain, fresh hops may be that their main function. Breweries can also have them shipped, and more and more do. All that visibility is good, but I still find people perplexed by the whole phenomenon, so let’s do a primer, with the caveat that if you really want to experience these beers, you need to come to Oregon and Washington, starting about the middle of September. The sheer number is massive, and that’s good, because fresh hop character is famously fleeting, so you need to drink ‘em when they’re fresh. It’s hard to do that elsewhere.
Let’s start with the nickel description. Hops are normally dried to preserve them for the coming year. This locks in the flavors and aromas, but it changes them in exactly the way drying changes an herb—compare the differences between fresh and dried basil. Fresh hop beers are made with undried cones, rushed straight from the field into the beer. They can be added at any time throughout the process, though breweries tend to find they get the biggest bang for their buck in whirlpool and dry-hop additions. The ideal process is picking up the hops moments after they’re plucked and rushing them to the brewery, though they can be shipped via airplane or flash-frozen and shipped.
That’s the overview, but let’s dig a little deeper.
What Do Fresh Hops Taste Like?
Hops are so expressive that it takes a little while to home in on the “fresh” qualities. They are distinctive, however, and two qualities are the easiest to spot. My favorite is a botanical richness that calls to mind the intensity of essential oil. She other classic presentation is a pithy chlorophyll flavor. Each variety will also taste different than its dried version, which can be confusing, or, if you really know a hop, exhilarating. The best way to develop a sense of these elements is drinking a bunch of them in a short span so that the unusualness emerges.
Fresh hop beers can also be gross if the brewery doesn’t know what they’re doing. Hops heat up after they’re picked and piled in a mass, so the longer a brewery waits to get them in a beer, the more they may begin to compost. You’ll see descriptions saying fresh hops are good for 36 hours, but that’s chilled and it’s a compromise. The degradation happens quickly, so the faster the better. Boiling the hops seems like a dicey prospect as well—though many brewers swear by it—because they seem to contribute more of that plant-y chlorophyll quality. If you encounter a beer that tastes gross, especially one that has a compost aroma, it’s a poor example. Move along to the next one.
Which Styles Work Best?
There are different ways to approach fresh hops. One is to overwhelm the beer with their intensity, and obviously, IPAs work best for this. For my money, though, that usually becomes a slightly confused affair, because hops’ innate intensity is already present. I prefer a mid-alcohol pale ale as a showcase for the fresh hop. Pale ales spotlight the freshness, and good ones seem to sparkle and glow with fresh-hop goodness. Another approach is to use them as a low-intensity accent in a style not known for hops—saisons or lagers, for example. They can add a wonderful layer when used well there, so don’t overlook those styles.
Freshness Matters
In no style of brewing is the date of packaging more important than with fresh hop beers. Cans seem to help lock in those evanescent qualities, but even still, these beers just don’t last. A couple years ago I judged them at the Oregon Beer Awards and in the medal round, a fresh-hop Wanderlust was the unanimous and immediate choice of every judge at the table. Just one week later, the Oregon Brewers Guild hosted their annual fresh-hop festival, and it was fine. In a week it had gone from obviously sublime to just fine. You gotta get ‘em while they’re fresh. If you’re buying canned beer, look at the package date and make sure they’re younger than a month old.
I’m in a Pub with Four Fresh-Hop Beers on Tap. Which One Do I Order?
This is a handy life hack for the traveler to places where this problem may present itself. Ask your server, “Which one came on tap most recently?” Order that one.
“Wet” or “Fresh?”
Fresh. The Brits call them “green-hop,” which I guess is fine for English beers. Just say no to “wet hop,” though, which is gross, inaccurate, misleading, and terrible.
If the Hops Have Been Dried Very Recently, Can They Be Called Fresh?
Absolutely not.
Why Did the Beers I Found at the Pub/Store All Use the Same Hop?
Hop varieties ripen at different rates, so you’ll find waves come out over the course of the season. Strata hops are among the earliest, and I’ve been seeing a lot of them around here lately. This is one reason, if you’re visiting, to shoot for mid- to late-September, when more waves have had an opportunity to roll through.
Now That Breweries Can Buy Flash-Frozen Fresh Hops Year-Round, Isn’t a “Season” Obsolete?
I’m glad this product exists, and frozen fresh hops do add a brightness to beer—but they’re not identical to fresh hops taken straight from the field. I’ve had enough beers made with them to confirm that you just don’t get that essential-oil character. Even when they’re very good, frozen foods don’t taste identical to fresh foods. If you want the real experience, you gotta drink ‘em fresh. (Homebrewers everywhere can experience this, too, by growing their own hops.)
Which Breweries Make the Best Fresh Hop Beers?
A few breweries do these really well, but honestly, the real joy is that you just don’t know. Any pint you order might be the best pint you’ll have all year. The only way to truly know is to get out there and sample.