Caldera's Hop Hash Ale is a partnership with Hopunion, LLC. Hop Hash is like a breakfast hash, but mashing different hop varieties instead of meat, potatoes and spices -- a twist on the American-Style Strong Pale Ale using pure lupulin for bitterness, taste and aroma. This ale gets its name from pure hop lupulin extracted and scraped from the Hopunion pelletizing line. Lupulin is the glandular powder separated from the strobiles of the Humulus Lupulus (hops) plant.
That's one of the strangest bottle descriptions I've read on a beer bottle in a while... scraped from a pelletizing line? My first assumption after reading this was that this beer was made with hops extract. After a little research, though, I was able to deduce that this beer is actually made using the left-over chunks of hops resin from the processing of Simcoe and Centennial crops. Not extract, just plant bits. Cool.
Hop Hash was first brewed for the 2011
Oregon Brewers Festival. This is the first bottling.
Tastes citrusy and bitter. I couldn't pick out any Simcoe or Centennial flavors specifically, which is somewhat surprising as they tend to be my favorite hops. A decent bready backbone, but not too heavy. This beer was better-than-average, but I wish that the hops flavors would have been a bit more refined. Tasty, still.