Old Town Brewing releases Hopicana Fresh Hop IPA + Collabs with Buoy and Gigantic
Northeast Portland’s Old Town Brewing has launched a new year-round Old Town IPA, and drops their fresh hop Hopicana IPA and the Buoy Beer collab Coastal Reign today in 16oz cans. Coming this October, Old Town Brewing and Gigantic Brewing advocate for choice with their I Voted IPA collaboration.
The simple and aptly named Old Town IPA is tentatively planned as a new flagship year-round beer. IPA’s are not new to Old Town Brewing, their longtime award-winning Shanghai IPA is more of an English-style IPA and Pillowfist, Haze of our Lives and Glow Torch are all hazy NE-style IPA’s.
Old Town IPA fits in snugly between the popular juicy haze craze beers and the classic West Coast-style IPA. Old Town IPA is clear-ish, unfiltered but not hazy. It’s clean and crisp, full flavored but with a moderate 6.1% abv. The hops on this beer are modern hits Mosaic, Citra, El Dorado and Amarillo and give it a tropical note with just the right amount of bitterness and American IPA flavors.
“We were really excited to launch a new flagship IPA that reflected the desires of today’s IPA drinkers. We’re calling it a modern Northwest IPA, combining traditional the Northwest style IPA with the hop profile that became popular with hazy IPAs. We have been working for more than 6 months to try and get the beer just right,” says Old Town Brewing owner Adam Milne.
Old Town describes their new IPA as having a percussion of citrus, stone fruit and a touch of pine character. The strong aroma carries well into the beer delivering a tsunami of flavor directly to the senses.
Hopicana is Old Town Brewing’s Fresh Hop hazy IPA that is hitting 16oz cans and draft this week. This is a beer for fans of fresh juicy flavors with just a bit of flavor and pungent qualities of the fresh Mosaic hops and the tropical aspects of fresh Citra. Those are backed up by dried additions of the old school Columbus hops and orange flavors of Amarillo hops.
Hopicana is 6.8% ABV and the brewery reports it has hints of juicy pineapple, ripe mango, fresh strawberry and zesty orange. Finishing slightly sweet and with a pillowy mouthfeel at 6.8% ABV.
“Being that Citra and Mosiac are cherished hops for hazy IPA's, we wanted to make a fresh hop beer with the two. Essentially it’s fresh hop version of our Pillowfist hazy IPA,” says Andrew Lamont, head brewer at Old Town Brewing.
Coastal Reign (Buoy Beer Collab)
Old Town Brewing brought one of America’s favorite small coastal towns to Portland with their new collaboration with Astoria, Oregon’s Buoy Beer. Coastal Reign fits nicely into the new U.S. lager beer trend of using southern hemisphere hops in a classic pilsner, call it a tropical pilsner.
Dubbed a Tropical NW Pilsner, Coastal Reign is a relatively sessionable 5.2% ABV and hopped with Wai-iti and Nelson Sauvin hops from New Zealand and Topaz hops from Australia. The flavor/aroma combo of these varieties throws off fresh lychee, pineapple, guava and citrus notes. If you close your eyes, you might even be able to see the palm trees through the pines.
“Making a beer with our friends at Buoy was a blast. Coastal Reign is a playful juxtaposition of the raining Oregon Coast with the tropical fruit characters found in the hops grown in the southern hemisphere.”
I VOTED IPA (Gigantic Brewing Collab)
With perhaps the most important election in our lifetimes coming up, Old Town Brewing and Gigantic Brewing wanted to encourage U.S. citizens to do their civic duty and vote. To do so they created a new beer wrapped in a 16oz can that serves as a checklist for key dates and with a QR code that links to an Oregon Voter Guide.
“Gigantic and Old Town really wanted to come together to encourage Oregonians to vote in the upcoming election. We want the I Voted IPA to serve as a reward for doing your civic duty.”
I Voted IPA is an American IPA, 6.8% ABV and will be released on October 8th, 2020.
Old Town Brewing’s pub on 5201 NE MLK Blvd. is open for business and a new street closure project is underway for open air family friendly dining and drinks. Trees were just added, more seating, and artwork and community activities are in the works. Northeast Portland, Portland, OR 97211