Showcasing Ontario Hops: Escarpment Labs Internal Homebrew Competition

September may mean that the warm days of summer are coming to an end, but it also means one important event for brewers: hop harvest time. The trellises are full of beautiful hop cones, in turn bringing a renewed sense of inspiration for brewers turning their attention to their tap lists for the year to come. 

Hops play such a key component of a beer's aroma and flavour; and, of course, add bitterness (among other things!). We had to think — how can we best utilize our yeast strains to highlight the unique characteristics of hops, especially locally grown Ontario hops? 

The perfect opportunity presented itself with our Summer Internal Homebrew Competition, where our staff grouped into teams and brewed a beer exclusively using Ontario hops, with the goal of making the hops the star of the brew. The rules were as follows:

1. Brew with discretion. This competition will be blind! Sensory tastings were held at both facilities.
2. Follow the Beer Targets below. This will help keep the competition blind
   • The beer must be relatively pale (4-15)
   • Make sure your beer is hop forward to showcase your Ontario hop choice
   • Target ABV is between 4-8%
3. All yeast are fair game
4. Beer will be judged on tastiest display of Ontario hops

Our competition organizers, Hana Knill (Data Scientist & Production Specialist) and Shelley Beirnes (Account Manager), had the incredible task of tracking down a variety of Ontario producers for our participants to choose from — and there was no shortage of great options to choose from. Participants had the choice of using:

• CanAussie Farms | Fergus, ON (Chinook, Crystal, Sterling, Cascade)
• Bulldog Hop Company | Harriston, ON (Michigan Copper, Comet, Triumph)
• Tavistock Hop Co. | Perth East, ON (Chinook, Glacier, Triple Pearl, Centennial, Cascade, Heritage)
• Backroads Hop Farm | Parkhill, ON (Triple Pearl, Magnum, Chinook, Centennial)
• Hayhoe Hops | Alymer, ON (Comet, Cascade, Chinook, Cascade (2021), Chinook (2021)
• The Hop House | Strathroy, ON (Chinook, Cascade, Centennial)

By mid-August, our 6 participating teams had their finished products packaged and ready to go for our sensory testing that was held at both facilities. Each beer was blindly tasted by our peers, and the final score was an amalgamation of the scores provided to an online survey from two categories; overall taste and how well the beer showcases Ontario hops (rating out of 5).

By the end of the day, we had our winners! 

	Name	Style	Members	Yeast	Hops	Score
1	The Continental	Grapefruit IPA	Camille, Krista, Attilio, Luisa	House Ale (EL-D1)	Bulldog (Comet) and Tavistock Hop Co. (Centennial, Cascade, Triple Perle)	4.14
2	One Another	Oat Pale Ale	Mo & Drew	Arset Kveik Blend	Triple Perle & Michigan Cooper	4.11
3	Friend of the Devil	American Pale Ale	Tomas & Adam	Thiol Libre	Chinook and dry hopped with Cascade & Comet	3.75
4	1000 Thiols	Session Pale Ale	Richard	Thiol Libre	Cascade (Tavistock)	3.03
5	GPA	Pale Ale	Chris Waterton, Nick, Joseph	Thiol Libre	Bertwell & Triple Pearl Hops	2.86
6	Summer of 69 oz	Pale Ale	Shelley	Hydra	Backroads Centennial, Bulldog Triumph, Tavistock Cascade	2.81

As you can see from the final scores, it was a very close competition with some great hop forward choices (and trust us, we're really tough critics).

Some teams went with the obvious choice (and current favourite strain!) of Thiol Libre — a hybrid engineered with the thiol compound 3-MHA and others to use biotransformation to encourage enhanced guava and passionfruit aromas from your hops.

Other choices included Arset Kveik Blend, which is similar to Hornindal (an incredibly versatile Kveik yeast) but has a broad temperature range, and another hybrid in Hydra, a genetic hybrid of two of our favourite strains (Cerberus x Vermont) that offers lower attenuation (65-72%) for a more juicy flavour coupled with strong mango and citrus aromatics.

All of these were great choices when it comes to pulling the natural highlights of the hops, really letting their nuances sing.

Why did you choose House Ale as your yeast?

Why did you choose the hops that you chose?

Key takeaways from the competition?

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The Continental | Grapefruit IPA, 6.2%