New Belgium Hop Kitchen Series

New Belgium Hop Tart, a Session Summer Sour

New Belgium Hop Tart has hit taps, celebrating summer. The Hop Kitchen offering is described as a “fruity spin” on a typical American sour ale.

New Belgium Hop Tart was build off Snapshot, the brewery’s summer wheat offering with peach juice. Continue Reading →

Posted in New Belgium, New Releases

New Belgium Botanical Imperial IPA joins Hop Kitchen Series

New Belgium Botanical Imperial IPA is the latest entry in the brewery’s ongoing Hop Kitchen Series.

This draft only beer is an IPA brewed with Cascade, Sterling, Willamette hops, and a variety of garden grown botanicals, including basil, sage and juniper.

Then we intensified the citrusy, herbal and spicy hop flavors with a blast of essential oils from backyard botanicals basil, sage and juniper to create the freshest IPA around. A touch of dark caramel malt adds a nice cushiony bed to the sip before the beer transitions into a warming, dry finish. Taste the bounty of Botanical Imperial IPA.

New Belgium Botanical Imperial IPA is a draft only offering, in limited quantities across the brewery’s distribution network.

Style: IPA (w/ Sage, Juniper, Basil)
Hops: Brave, Cascade, Sterling, Willamette
Malts: Pale, Caramel-120

Availability: Draft Only
Release: March, 2016

8.5% ABV, 85 IBUs

by Reid Ramsay
Posted in Don't Miss This, New Belgium, New Releases

New Belgium Hop Stout Joins Hop Kitchen Series

New Belgium Hop Stout joins the brewery’s Hop Kitchen Series here at the end of September.

New Belgium Hop Stout is described by the brewery as one of the “burliest” beers in the Kitchen Series. The 8% imperial stout boasts a bitter 100 IBU (international bitterness units) rating. That’s imperial IPA territory.

“We wanted a wickedly hoppy and deeply malty stout to celebrate the fall season,” said Grady Hull, Assistant Brewmaster of New Belgium Brewing. “Hop Stout draws you into the malty woodwork of a traditional stout and then the hops storm in. It’s a really incredible, complex beer for those seeking a little more adventure with the change of seasons.”

New Belgium Hop Stout is a draft only offering, hitting taps now until it runs dry.

Style: Imperial Stout
Hops: Equinox, Chinook and Willamette

Availability: Draft
Release: Late September, 2015

8% ABV, 100 IBUs

by Reid Ramsay
Posted in Don't Miss This, New Belgium, New Releases

New Belgium Hop Tart, a Session Summer Sour

New Belgium Hop Tart has hit taps, celebrating summer. The Hop Kitchen offering is described as a “fruity spin” on a typical American sour ale.

New Belgium Hop Tart was build off Snapshot, the brewery’s summer wheat offering with peach juice. The wort is soured using a unique in-house process.

Hop Tart’s lactobacillus offers just the slightest hint of sour that propels bursts of passion fruit, guava and pineapple, courtesy of hefty Nelson Sauvin, Galaxy and Experimental Hop 522 dry-hopping.

New Belgium Hop Tart is a draft-only offering across then brewery’s distribution area.

Style: American Sour/Wild Ale
Hops: Nelson, Sauvin, Galaxy, Experimental Hop 522 (Dry-Hop)

Availability: Draft only
Release: June, 2015

5% ABV, 30 IBUs

by Reid Ramsay
Posted in Half Acre Brewing, Headlines, New Belgium

New Belgium Oatmeal IPA, a Half Acre Collaboration

New Belgium Oatmeal IPA joins the brewery’s Hop Kitchen Series, a collaboration with Chicago’s Half Acre Beer Company.

The idea to create Oatmeal IPA started about four years ago when New Belgium’s brewmaster Peter Bouckaert visited Half Acre. This collab actually turned out to be two beers, the first dating back to 2013 with Avoine IPA.

Avione (which means “oats”) was an “oat-spiked” IPA that was only available in Chicago on draft. Those who have had it, consider that a teaser beer for what Oatmeal IPA has become.

This 2015 release is honey-hued with a velvety mouthfeel that offers brilliant pine, grass and guava courtesy of Citra and Centennial dry-hopping. Oatmeal IPA is ultra-tropical and appears softer than the traditional IPA, but be warned – lurking beneath the smooth oats and toasted malts, are vibrant hops with a bitter bite.

New Belgium Oatmeal IPA is a wider release, but draft only.

Style: IPA
Hops: Citra, Centennial
Malts: Oatmeal, ???

Availability: Draft only

6% ABV, 60 IBUs

by Reid Ramsay
Posted in Coming Soon, Headlines, New Belgium

New Belgium Hop Kitchen #7, Hop the Pond

New Belgium Brewing’s “Hop Kitchen” is a hoppy playground for the brewers to play around. The seventh edition of the series is a veritable United Nations of hops additions you’ll come to know as Hop the Pond. So named, because the beer features hops and malts from many nations.

Hop the Pond IPA is a trip around the world in 80 IBUs. Experience Admiral hops from England, Galaxy from Australia and Citra from the US of A. The malt bill hails from Chile, Germany, England and Canada. Set sail with one sip.

New Belgium Hop the Pond will be available in 22oz bombers, and draft.

Style: Imperial IPA
Hops: Admiral, Galaxy, Citra
Arrival: TBA

8% ABV

by Reid Ramsay
Posted in Coming Soon, New Belgium

A New Addition to New Belgium’s Hop Kitchen

New Belgium Hop Kitchen Fresh Hop IPA

New Belgium readies a new addition to the Hop Kitchen Series. The “kitchen” is a hoppy playground for the brewers to play. Other additions to the series include French Aramis IPA, and Hoppy Bock Lager. Fresh Hop India Pale Ale is on the horizon, a fresh hop “salmon safe” IPA. Salmon-Safe is a non profit that works to keep watersheds clean for native salmon to thrive. Essentially, the hops come from a Salmon-Safe certified.

Fresh, aromatic, and green as a Leprechaun’s skivvies., Certified Salmon Safe Oregon Hops are picked fresh off the vine and trucked directly to our brew kettle. 

Style: IPA
Availability: 22oz bombers, Draft
Arrival: TBA

7% ABV

by Reid Ramsay
Posted in New Belgium

New Belgium Launches Hop Kitchen “French Aramis”

New Belgium Hop Kitchen French Aramis

Fresh cut flowers and garden herbs. That’s how New Belgium Brewing (Ft. Collins, CO) describes their second release in their Hop Kitchen Series. French Aramis follows Hoppy Bock Lager which arrived in March of this year. You can expect four beers in this hoppy playground in 2013.

A drier IPA for the summer, brewed with French Aramis hops to create an aroma of fresh cut flowers and garden herbs. 

Style: IPA
Hops: French Aramis
Availability: 22oz Bombers

6.7% ABV

Read more: New Belgium Hop Kitchen Series

by Reid Ramsay