You made it clear to us that quite a few of you wanted more hops. Actually, only hoppy beers to be specific.  We stuck our toe in the water earlier in the year and officially offered our members a way to customize their shipments each month, essentially calling us at the beginning of the month, finding out what the featured beers were and having us put only the hop-centric ones in their box that month.  It was better than nothing, but in the end, not optimal because you guys had to remember to call us and if only one or two of the four featured beers were aggressively hopped, you’d only get one or two beers that month.

So we’ve been quietly working with a lot of different breweries, better understanding how much it would cost to deliver a club that only features kick-ass, hoppy beers each month.  Not just IPAs mind you.  That would be so limiting, and you’d miss out on some really amazing hoppy beers.  Brewers are creating styles faster than ever.  More and more, you can’t easily categorize a beer neatly into any given style.  Take for example Mikkeller’s Wit Fit, which the brewery describes as a hoppy imperial wit.  Clearly not an IPA, but I’m here to tell you, Hop-heads will love this beer as it delivers plenty of citric, floral, and resinous notes, some acidity, and a clinging bitterness that hangs on in the finish.  Don’t panic. We’re going to run a ton of IPAs in the club.  In fact the majority of what we feature will be IPAs, but we’re also going to run India Pale Lagers (IPLs), hoppy Red and Pale Ales, and other hop-centric beers.   Hops are obviously the key ingredient used to balance the malty sweetness in a beer’s flavor profile, but they also contribute some pretty amazing aromatics and flavors so we’re not just focusing on beers that have crushingly bitter hop profiles, but also beers that explore the many hop flavors and aromas available to today’s brewers.

The club will feature two or more breweries each month and we’ll even drop in an import in there from time to time when it makes sense. There are some really neat breweries out there now like Mexico’s Agua Mala and Germany’s BRLO that are crafting outstanding American style IPAs and other hoppy styles that are just now making their way to the American marketplace.  That said, I expect something like 90% of our featured beers to come from US breweries.  We’re gonna send ya twelve, 12-oz. beers in each shipment, 3 different beers (4 bottles or cans of each).

We’ve got some pretty sweet beers lined up for our inaugural shipment in November, including Route 1A, an 8.2% ABV big, boldly flavored Double IPA from Ipswich Brewery in Massachusetts.  You’re gonna dig it.

No one else is doing anything quite like this in the market today, so naturally we’re really excited about this club and hope you are too!

Prost!
Kris

How cool is this label?  I couldn’t be more pleased with this project. From start to finish, Ron Jeffries, co-founder and head brewer for Jolly Pumpkin, has been super cool about creating a beer to pay tribute to an old friend of mine, Rosie, my 19 year old Maine Coon cat that passed last October.  We wanted to make a big and unique red ale to match his personality and have the beer community and our customers name the beer.  The people chose “Rosie del Barrio”, loosely translated to Rosie in the hood, which is pretty appropriate as he always pretty much made himself at home in my neighbor’s houses and was always largely considered a neighborhood cat.

Ron just sent over the label design today and I absolutely LOVE IT!  It actually really looks a bit like the neighborhood I lived in when we were just starting the business and where Rosie spent his rowdy teenage years.  In fact, the label is pretty much the view from my old bedroom window and front porch. Tom’s house is on the left, Jerry’s on the right.  Rosie in fact did used to jump from Tom’s roof to Jerry’s roof all the time (Not until this day did I note the irony of my neighbors being named Tom & Jerry).  He’d get up on Tom’s roof by climbing a big avocado tree we had in the courtyard.  It was a solid little community and Rosie was a big part of it.

Adam Forman is the artist behind Jolly Pumpkin’s labels and is a longtime friend of Ron and Laurie Jeffries.

Nice work Adam!  Thank you!

Prost!
Kris

I’m getting better at doing nothing. This last Sunday, I did just that for a glorious 3 hours. Just listened to some Cajun music in the sun while enjoying what many consider to be one of, if not the best, lambics the world has to offer, Cantillon’s Classic Gueuze 100% Lambic. This one’s a rare bird to be sure which I’m fairly confident contributed to the whole experience. Only about 50 cases enter the US each year and we were able to score a few from one of our favorite importers, Shelton Brothers.

It was pretty hazy with a golden, tangerine hue. Very tart and funky. I enjoyed it even more once it warmed up. The oak was there with hints of barrel contributions (vanilla/tannins). In the end, I dug it very much and decided to selfishly set aside a few more bottles for later as Ken suggests in our tasting notes.

I think I’m going to work on doing nothing more often.

Prost!
Kris