Southern Tier Hop Sun

Another Friday, another New York brewery to talk about. Souther Tier Brewing, located in Lakewood, in the far western corner of the state, near Jamestown, brews up a wide, wide range of beer, ranging from the normal year-round crowd-pleasers (IPA, Porter, Pale Ale), to their big bottle, high-alcohol series of experiments (Creme Brulee, Javah, Mokah, Cherry Saison…). They’ve been in the city for most of their eight years of existence, and I have to believe we’re their largest market.

Hop Sun was born a few years ago as a summer seasonal beer. I suspect as its popularity grew, the definition of “summer” changed, to the point that it can be found in late March now. Southern Tier bills the Hop Sun as a “summer wheat beer”, which is as apt a description as I need. The bottle label states it’s “brewed with one variety of hops and 3 types of malts” — besides the wheat malt and a base barley malt like pilsner or pale, if not both, it can’t be very much of anything if the desired flavors if Southern Tier wants it to taste like a hoppy wheat beer. Which they do, and do well. And at 4.9% alcohol by volume, it’s also a sessionable beer — I enjoy drinking beer (sometimes) that simply won’t alter my perception of the world very quickly, but also tastes good enough to just keep ordering instead of trying to sample everything on the menu.

Hop Sun pours lightly hazy, but more or less clear pale gold, with a thin white head that quickly waves goodbye save a few little patches floating on top. The beer gives off a cereal-grain kind of aroma, sort of a cross between corn and oatmeal (not that corn is used in this beer). The beer is dry-hopped to add more hop aroma and a little bit of flavor, and some of that comes through in the nose. Not as much as I’ve experienced on draft, but there’s a little smack to the face here to offset the graininess.

The taste is more Alpha-Bits than Corn Pops, but with the added bonus of a little hop bite — nothing extraordinary or pronounced, but pleasantly there. There’s a decent amount of bitterness from the hops though, which really pulls this beer together into something interesting. On the whole, it’s rather thin, but that’s a good thing for this style, and while the cereal grains disappear for the most part in the finish, the hoppy bitterness remains fairly level. In short, all around flavor without ever being intense.

I recommend the Hop Sun, but it’s probably seen its last brew day for the year. I purchased a six-pack in early July — at $10 (Whole Foods) it’s a bit steep, but this is Manhattan, that’s the going rate these days for decent craft beer. Product still on the shelves will be fine to drink for another couple of months, and with the weather what it is these days, who wouldn’t want to drink something tasty as well as quenching?

If you can’t find Hop Sun, well, there are a few options. Along the lines of clean, somewhat-hoppy beers, though it is not anything remotely wheat-like, Pilsner Urquell fills the bill nicely. Sierra Nevada’s newest wheat, the “Kellerweis Hefeweizen,” is fairly clean (no fruity or banana flavors, really) and readily available as well. But do try to find the Hop Sun.

There’s the temptation to drink this as cold as possible, but with taste this good, you wouldn’t want to numb your taste buds — a few minutes out of the refrigerator should do it. Enjoy Hop Sun at home and enjoy it while out, and beat the heat!