Apparently, we are beer influencers now. Yeah, we are pretty surprised, too, but that was the reasoning behind the good folks at Yakima Chief Hops offering to send us a four-pack of Early Winters IPA, a collaboration of theirs with Old Schoolhouse Brewery of Winthrop, Washington.

The reason for this IPA being special is that its primary hop addition is the new HBC 630, which might as well be named “Our New Favorite Hop on Earth.” No, really, it is delicious.

Kelly Lohrmeyer, the regional manager for Yakima Chief Hops, sent us the beer free of charge and included this handy description of what we were in for as far as HBC 630 went: “HBC 630 is a granddaughter of Warrior and resulted from a cross made in 2008. It was selected for its moderately low alpha, low co-humulone and distinct aroma. It presents an aroma note of cherry or raspberry candy with pronounced tropical notes. Alpha 12-15% Bets 5.5-6.3% Co-H 23-26% Total Oil 2.0-3.0.”

Oh, yeah, it fit that description to a T. But, rather than ramble on here, how about we just jump to our Zoom review on YouTube?

If any local breweries get their hands on HBC 630, we very much look forward to just what they can create with it. (And, hopefully, they let us know when they do!)

We are always open to suggestions for future beer reviews, so drop us a line via social media direct messaging.

Cheers!

— Stoutmeister