Hopulist Issue2

Hazy heroes
Verdant moved from the shipping container
to another industrial unit and started selling
beers, with six fermenters by this time. James
also decided to move away from liquid yeast,
which Verdant had been using for these early
brews: “We wanted consistency and liquid yeast
provides its own headaches through harvesting
and nurturing it, which wasn’t ideal when we
still all had full-time jobs.
“We built a range around US-05 yeast, our
beers Bloom and Pulp came about from
working around this yeast, but we kept the
malt and hop bills distinctly New England. We
moved back to liquid yeast when we moved to
our current brewery, we went back to our old
original recipes and also started to produce the
kind of beers we are more known for these days.
“We like to think we’ve spent the last four years
working towards this point. We were making
the New England style quite happily and we got
affirmation that we were on the right track when
Cloudwater released their DIPA series. We are
often put into a small category of breweries in
the UK responsible for the current hazy beer
movement, the others being DEYA, Northern
Monk and Cloudwater. It’s a nice movement to
be a part of.”
James comes from a catering background, so
flavours in beers is what he is all about. In his
own words, he wants people to go crazy about
this style of beer and wants them to be able to
smell the aromas from two feet away from a
cracked open can.
“We l|ke to
th| nk we’ve
spent the
last four
years work| n g
towards th| s
po| nt. We are
often put
| nto a small
category of
brewer| e s
| n the Uk
respons| b l e
for the
current hazy
beer movement,
the others
be| ng Deya,
Northern
Monk and
Cloudwater.
| t’s a n| c e
movement to
be a part of.”