Scottish ale fraternizes with exotic hops in a firkin, Friday at Smokehouse Brewing

Looking to expand your exposure to the ever growing selection of hops that are coming out? Smokehouse Brewing is here to help. Starting today they are going to be serving MacLenny’s Scottish Ale, dry hopped with rather exotic single hop varieties, as the featured beer on Firkin Fridays.

If a beer made by caramelizing the malts in the boil kettle, served out of a firkin, and infused with the aroma and flavor of a hop variety so new that it was referred to as HBC 366 until very recently doesn’t pique your interest, your beer geek credentials are on shaky ground. I’ll be honest, a malty Scotch Ale is not the obvious vehicle to showcase the tropical flavors of exotic hop strains, but consider my curiosity piqued.

For more information I’ll go straight to the words of owner Lenny Kolada:

We’re starting something pretty cool.  We thought that beer geeks would like to explore the taste of various hop varieties. In order to do it without a lot of fuss, we thought Firkin Fridays would be the perfect vehicle.  We are going to offer MacLenny’s Scottish Ale on firkin, dry hopped with a single hop variety on successive Fridays (though not necessarily on consecutive Fridays so we can feature our other beers.) It starts this Friday with MacLenny’s Scottish Ale dry hopped with Equinox. Equinox has a pronounced aroma profile with citrus, tropical fruit, floral and herbal characteristics. Specific descriptions include lemon, lime, papaya, apple and green pepper.  The other hops we’ll feature include, in the order they will be presented Pacific Jade, Wakatu, Nelson Sauvin and Motueka.

Here are short descriptions of the aroma characteristics of the remaining hops (taken from the Hopunion website), all of which originated in hop fields near Nelson, New Zealand:

Pacific Jade – Bold herbal aromas with hints of fresh citrus and crushed black pepper.

Wakatu – Restrained floral notes and freshly zested lime.

Nelson Sauvin – Distinct cool climate and white wine “fruitiness” with fresh crushed gooseberry and grape infused flavors.

Motueka – Lively lemon and lime tones with background hints of tropical fruit.