Monday, July 13, 2009

Southern Hemisphere Harvest Fresh Hop Ale, Sierra Nevada Brewing Co., Chico, California

Vincent 'Vinnie' Antonelli: Arugula. I haven't had arugula in six weeks.
Supermarket Manager: What's that?
Vincent 'Vinnie' Antonelli: It's a vegetable

Classic line from My Blue Heaven, which if you saw the movie you know that Steve Martin nailed the delivery. Why is this important? Well after sipping on the Southern Hemisphere Harvest Fresh Hop Ale, I turned to the Knight of Saint Arnold and said, "this beer tastes like arugula." Now, should a beer taste like a peppery lettuce? I don't think so, especially since I think arugula is a vile weed. The beer was so bitter that it was detracting from any good elements of the beer. The beer was very similar to Harpoon's Glacier Harvest which I also wasn't that big on. The beer does have a 6.7% ABV, but honestly I wouldn't try this one again. The Fresh Hop Ale gets a 1.5








7 comments:

jay said...

i dont have a clue what arugala tastes like, but i'm assuming its not good

Mike said...

I liked the Glacier Harvest, so I'm going to keep an eye out for this one. I had another fresh hop beer at the American Craft Beer Fest (no idea which beer it was) and it was similarly flavored.

Bigfoot said...

Man You are definately are NOT a Hop Head!
Otherwise you would appreciate the time this world class brewery took to ship these precious New Zealand Hops all the way to Chico, CA. and brew with them Fresh.

This is a great beer for the Fresh Hop Lovers, but it's not for everyone. Some must stay with what they know plain and simple beers.

It definately doesn't taste like a Arugala,it's more like sucking on a fresh hop mmmmm.....good!!!!

Beer Crusade said...

I think my track record on the site would show that I actually prefer the strongly hopped beers, in fact if you were to look at the IPAs I have reviewed they are consistently rated the highest amongst all the beers on the site. Just because I don't like this one, doesn't mean I don't like the rest. Of course I may be off my rocker, after all I am responding to a mythic beast of the Pacific Northwest.

Knight of Saint Arnold said...

Not to join Bigfoot in bashing on Beer Crusade, but I had this beer a couple of nights ago, and it was great! My expectations were very low, given the abysmal review. But I was surprised that it was full of unique hop flavors that you don't usually experience in a dry-hopped beer. In fact, I might go back and get more.

I believe that you had this one on tap. I had a bottle (24 oz), which might help to explain the difference. It was $3.99 for the 24oz bottle. Definitely worth it!

Beer Crusade said...

Wow, stabbed in the back by the Kinght of Saint Arnold. Not cool, dude, not cool.

Anonymous said...

I had this beer over the weekend and love it. It is well balanced with fantastic hop flavors. Kudos to SNB for a job well done!