Hop Stop; American hops

Last week we launched our new series of blogs taking a geekier look into some of the ingredients we use in beer, what it does and why it's awesome. We kicked off with pale and pilsen malts and will be looking at more malts soon, and we've touched on some of our smaller-scale kits but first I think it's time to took a look at our best buds, hops!

Hop to it!
Ok so first thing's first, what the hell is a hop? Well, hops as used in brewing are the flowers of hop bines, or Humulus Lupulus to use their Latin name. They grow crazy fast, I'm talking up to half a metre in a week, and it's the female flowers we harvest and use to brew with.
 
Alpha acids in hops are what give beer bitterness. These isomerise during the brew to form "iso-alpha acids" and that's what tastes bitter. The longer you leave the hops in the kettle, the more bitter it'll be, and the more bittering hops you use, the more you intensify that. Whack the hops in right at the end after fermentation instead of early on in the boil (aka, dry hopping) and you'll just get a huge hit of aroma from these flowers and none of the alpha-acid aggression.
 
(By the by, yes, hops are closely related to the Marijuana plant, coming from the same family "cannabaceae". Hops don't contain THC though, which is the compound that gets you all bleary-eyed and peckish)

So what are the powers of the superhero that is the hop? Well, they are manifold. As mentioned above, bitterness is a major skill of the humble hop. Alpha acids vary by hop variety, so some have more prevalent bittering abilities than others. These alpha acids are partially made up of isohumulones, which not only contribute to bitterness but also enhance the head retention of the beer. It therefore stands to reason that hoppier beers will have better head retention. The malts and other ingredients will also have an effect, but the hops lend an important helping hand!  

All hops also impart bucket loads of aroma and flavour through essential oils, and again these will vary depending on the hop you've got hold of. We'll be delving into different regional characteristics of hops over the coming weeks! The three major essential oils found in hops are mycrene, humulen and caryophyllene. We'll also be looking at these oils in more depth in subsequent blog posts.

While they're smelling beautiful, tasting delicious and spiking your tastebuds with bitter bites, hops are also multitasking and helping preserve the beer. They contain anti-microbial attributes that stop beer from spoiling. Can you see why we dig 'em so much yet?

American Hops
American hops are some of the darling buds we use most of at BrewDog, in fact we are one of the biggest buyers of Simcoe hops in the world (is it any wonder James' dog is called Simcoe?!). So we dig these. They are mostly grown in three states, Washington, Oregon and Idaho, and we make regular trips to the Yakima Valley in particular for the annual "sniff n rub" to see what we want to buy in bulk each year.
 
If you hear anyone talking about "C-hops", they're not being incredibly rude, but they're probably referring to the verging-on-a-conspiracy-theory number of American hops that start with the letter C; Chinook, Centennial, Cascade, Columbus…it's like Sesame Street was stuck on the letter C for a few too many weeks when the producers of these hops had their thinking caps on for names. American hops will generally play host to loads of citrus fruit and pine notes. Think grapefruit, resin, fresh lemon peel, orange and tangerine. Thirsty? I thought so.
 
Let get up close and personal with some of our most well known American-hopped beers to see how they present these hop characteristics…

Hardcore IPA
Centennial, Columbus, Simcoe
Hopped like crazy and then dry-hopped to hell and back, this is one helluva hoppy double IPA. If you want to see what a mega hop bomb is like and see how a number of American hops can meld and marry together for a mix of flavours and aromas, this is your beer.
 
Hardcore IPA has some serious malt character up front, it's sweet and thick on the nose, but the hops bring plenty of bitterness to balance it and bring it to life. The Centennial is mainly responsible for some fruity-floral aromas as opposed to the onslaught of bitterness, which can be chalked up to our old friend Columbus. Columbus is a high-alpha variety hop, with a relatively similar flavour and aroma profile to Centennial but with a bit more herbal density to it. Simcoe also splits the difference as a bittering and aroma hop. It's huge on pine, with a earthy, herbal tinge and a decent slew of fruit.

Libertine Black Ale
Simcoe
Libertine is a single hop beer, meaning we've just treated this brew to a boat load of Simcoe. IPAs rocking Simcoe are renowned across the west coast of America, but this takes all that depth of flavour to the dark side combining the piney, zippy fruit of Simcoe with the indulgent malt of a big stout. It's not heavy, though. It's relatively delicate on the palate, giving plenty of airtime for that Simcoe to dance across your nose and tongue without a massive supporting cast and crew of other hops to crowd it.

Five AM Red Ale
Nelson Sauvin (NZ), Amarillo / Simcoe, Cascade, Centennial
Five AM bolsters a lot of one of our favourite New Zealand hops up front, so we'll skim over that for now and come to them another day. But back in the US of A, the Amarillo is a massively orangey example of American hops. It smells like breakfast with loads of orange and grapefruit flirting up front, and the mega malts of Five AM add a much-needed side of toast and biscuit. The dry-hopping with our old friends the C-hops, and Simcoe, adds bags of citrus, herby-berry and pine aroma to the already very pithy frisson of bitter fruits.
 
What American hop rocks your world and why?