The Summer IPA Box #2 KVB Summer IPA Box The Kent Hop Trail: August Edition This Month: The Summer IPA BoxFour breweries. Six IPAs. The last days of summer. August in Kent means one thing for beer: the hop harvest is coming. The bines are heavy, the air smells of resin and green, and the county's brewers are about to start making the freshest beer of the year. This box is the final summer statement before that happens — six IPAs from four Kent breweries, ranging from a 3.4% session opener to a 7.8% birthday DIPA that demands your full attention. Drink them in order. Take your time. What's In August's Box Smesh — Time & Tide, Deal | Session IPA, 3.4%Start here. Mosaic, Galaxy, Motueka and Vic Secret — four hops doing serious work in a very light frame. Citrus, grapefruit, lemon and tropical fruit all present and correct at 3.4%. The one you open at 3pm on a Friday and don't feel bad about. Sunday — Moot Brew Co, Rochester | Session IPA, 4%Named exactly right. A rich, full-bodied malt base gets behind an aromatic hop character full of spice, fruit and pine, Kentish Ernest and Goldings in the whirlpool, then double dry-hopped with Mosaic and Simcoe for good measure. From a small Rochester outfit quietly making some of the most interesting beer in North Kent. Hurricane — Wantsum Brewery, St Nicholas at Wade | IPA, 4.5%SIBA South East Award winner, 2023. Wantsum have been brewing in the Wantsum Valley since 2010 and this is their flagship IPA. Mosaic and Citra do what they do best, citrus punch up front, tropical underneath with oats in the mash giving it a smooth, full body that most 4.5% IPAs can't match. Clean, bright, built for drinking outside. Arcane — Moot Brew Co, Rochester | Cold IPA, 4.5%Cold IPA is what happens when lager discipline meets IPA ambition. Fermented cold and lagered for two weeks for a clean, crisp finish that most IPAs can't touch. Moot have loaded it with UK, US and New Zealand hops: Nectaron brings peaches and nectarines, Cascade and Citra push citrus and grapefruit, Superdelic adds a hint of red berry right at the end. All the fruit character of a hazy, none of the murk. Pedding Lane — Ramsgate Brewery (Gadds'), Broadstairs | English IPA, 6.5%Gadds' own description: plain, old fashioned, no-nonsense Kent-hopped IPA. That's exactly what it is. Dry, bitter, properly hopped with East Kent varieties grown a few miles from the brewery. The heritage anchor of the box — everything the county's hop-growing history tastes like in one can. High Five — Moot Brew Co, Rochester | DIPA, 7.8%Save this one for last. Brewed to celebrate Moot's fifth birthday, High Five layers Superdelic, Mosaic and Strata for a slight grassy aroma on the nose, then a super soft body with a sweet, creamy finish that gives way to stone fruits, candy and citrus. A proper occasion beer. At 7.8% it earns the closer spot — and then some. The Breweries This Month Four breweries, four corners of Kent. Time & Tide have been making some of the most exciting hop-forward beer in the county from their base in Deal since 2017. Moot Brew Co are a Rochester microbrewery punching well above their weight — three beers in this box is no accident, they're just that good right now. Wantsum Brewery have been farming and brewing in the Wantsum Valley between Canterbury and Thanet since 2010, with a SIBA award cabinet to show for it. And Ramsgate Brewery, trading as Gadds', have been going since 2002, the East Kent old guard, still making the most uncompromising traditional IPA in the county. Drinking Order Start light. Finish big. Smesh — Time & Tide, 3.4% Sunday — Moot, 4% Hurricane — Wantsum, 4.5% Arcane — Moot, 4.5% Pedding Lane — Gadds', 6.5% High Five — Moot, 7.8%
