What’s the best way to think about advanced hop products? Not long ago, most craft brewers would have answered, “Not at all.”
Today, a better answer is, “Quit calling them downstream products. Think of them like you do hops themselves and learn what to expect from them.”
Brewers have leapt over what Totally Natural Solutions managing director Colin Wilson once labeled the “emotional hurdle” that kept them from using “Generation One” products. Next up, he says, is learning how to best brew with “Generation Two” products, while ending confusion about functionality versus form.
New products with attention-getting names and some of those that have been around longer both illustrate what he means.