曙 (Akebono)

1 bar limited to 1x kegs max

While we make hoppy beers in the American style and hybrid versions with Belgian yeast, the majority of them tend to be on the more balanced side with hop flavour and aroma given more preference than bitterness or maltiness. With this release, however, we wanted it to be one with a lot of impact and something a little different than anything we had brewed before. To achieve this we looked to a huge amount of malted wheat (40% of the total grain recipe), an amalgamation of some of our favourite dankly tropical hops, and no bittering hop addition.

The result is an 8.0% ABV Double Wheat IPA that certainly packs a wallop! The wheat malt leaves a deeply rich and silky mouthfeel and creates a perfect backdrop for more than 10g/L (2 lbs/bbl) of hops. The high ABV leaves a feeling of sweetness that brings out the dank tropical flavour of hops from the US (Zythos, Columbus, and HBC 344), while the aroma is dominated by the Australian varieties Enigma and Vic Secret. This is certainly a tropical hop bomb that we are looking forward to sharing with you!

Naming: Non-Japanese speakers familiar with “Akebono” will probably think of the famous sumo wrestler, who was a dominant yokozuna in the 1990s.  What people may be less familiar with is the origin of the name.  Akebono means “dawn” or “daybreak”, which seemed somewhat of a fitting name for our first IPA of the year and, since this was to be our first IPA of the year, we decided to go all out and make it as hard-hitting as possible.

We used a large volume of hops and plenty of wheat for a full mouthfeel, not to mention an ABV of 8.0% as well.  While starting the day with this beer is not advised, we think this should make for an impactful first IPA of the year, with the weight of a yokozuna and an appropriately strong punch!

Style: Double IPA

Malt Bill:

Pilsner, Wheat

Hops:

Bittering: None

Flavour/Aroma: Columbus, Zythos, HBC 344, Enigma, Vic Secret

Yeast: US-05 American Ale

ABV: 8.0%

IBU: 45

Gas Volumes: 2.4