Wharrgarbl 2017

The first locally-brewed, fresh-hop beer of the year gets released today at Bare Bones Brewery. It’s named Wharrgarbl 2017. The beer was brewed 11 days ago. It’ll go on tap this afternoon.

Bare Bones head brewer RJ Nordlund with Wharrgarbl 2017.

It’s the second fresh hop beer Nordlund has made at Bare Bones. The hops for last year’s batch came from Michigan. This year’s cones are from Gorst Valley Hops in Nekoosa. The farm is about 80 miles west of Oshkosh.

Gorst Valley Hops

“We were out there on the Friday, the day they were picking them,” Nordlund says. “We got to see them feeding them through the harvester.”

“We brought them back that same day and brewed the next morning.”

More than 100 pounds of freshly picked cascade went into the 15-barrel batch. It all went into the kettle during the last 20 minutes of the boil.

I had a chance to try the beer yesterday as Nordlund was taking it from the fermentor into kegs. It tastes vibrant. Just as you’d expect from something so fresh. The flavor is unlike that of dried hops. It’s a full, rounded flavor with an earthiness I can’t put my finger on. That word “green” kept coming back to me. There are no sharp edges. The bitterness is mild. It has a ripe, soft character.

“Doing it this way where all the hops are backloaded towards the end of the boil worked pretty well,” Nordlund says. “You're not throwing any of the wet hops away for bitterness, you're just pulling all the flavor out of them.”

At 7.2% ABV, this year’s Wharrgarbl is stronger than last year’s batch. “I wanted a little more alcohol this year,” Nordlund says. “It balances out because there's no strong bitterness from the hops.”

Balance is the right word. Without balance this type of beer is wretched. I’ve had my share of those. They taste like swamp water.

For these to be good, that fresh-hop flavor has to work in tandem with the malt. But balance seems to trip people up. There's a misplaced expectation that fresh-hop beers should carry the same concentrated hop flavors as beers made from pelletized hops. That's not the case. Freshly picked hops are a different thing. They produce different flavors and aromas. Less intense, but when used right, more interesting.

Wharrgarbl is just what a good fresh-hop beer should be. And the best time to experience a beer such as this is at peak. That would be right now.