Gensen--Fresh Hop
Kyoto Brewing Company in Kyoto-shi, Kyoto, Japan 🇯🇵
Collab with: Flora FermentationIPA Special
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Score
7.01
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玄選 フレッシュホップ編 (GENSEN - FRESH HOP)
A REFRESHING WET HOP IPA, WITH AROMAS OF FRESHLY PICKED ORANGE FLOWERS
[Character]
A grapefruit and citrus-forward IPA with notes of tropical stone fruits. Hopped with freshly picked Chinook grown in Shiga, the beer offers a nuance of fresh cut flowers, leaving orange blossoms on the palate. This beer is light and pale in colour, and with a dry finish to help quench the summer heat's thirst.
[Food Pairing]
Oven baked zucchini stuffed with spiced lamb mince, deep fried herbed white fish, prawn and mango sweet and sour tacos
[Naming]
"Gensen" essentially means carefully selected, and it felt to us like a fitting name for this mini-series, all based upon carefully chosen or selected ingredients that we wanted to shine a spotlight on.
[Brewer's Voice]
When it came to crafting a beer to use with Shiga fresh hops, we needed to focus on giving the hops a stage in which they would shine. Fresh hops are meant to be fresh, and so we made sure that these hops were picked and brewed within 24hrs. Using wet hops quickly is critical to maintaining quality, as they begin to oxidize very rapidly at this stage.
As to the variety, we were offered Chinook. Chinook is an interesting hop, offering a variety of flavours and aromas depending greatly on where it was grown, and the weather conditions of that season. Knowing this, we wanted to give this beer a clean but simple malt base to really let the terroir of the Shiga grown hops come through. We used a blend of Maris Otter and wheat for the base, giving the beer a soft and light body with a bit of mouthfeel so as not to get in the way of the hop aromas. Fresh hops tend to give a bright floral character, with a slightly “greener” brightness. While this character is very pleasant in small amounts, in large amounts it can result in a vegetal-like character, and so to prevent this we limited the fresh hops to a large whirlpool addition, while pairing it with classic hop pellets throughout the rest of the brewing process. Some Centennial and Citra were used to boost the citrus peel and piney floral character of the fresh Chinook. We finished this beer out on the drier side using a neutral clean fermenting California ale strain of yeast. Fresh hop beers are a fun treat as you get a unique hop brightness that can only be achieved once a season.
Style: Fresh Hop IPA
Series: Nakama
Category: Beer
JAN: 4589718742786
A REFRESHING WET HOP IPA, WITH AROMAS OF FRESHLY PICKED ORANGE FLOWERS
[Character]
A grapefruit and citrus-forward IPA with notes of tropical stone fruits. Hopped with freshly picked Chinook grown in Shiga, the beer offers a nuance of fresh cut flowers, leaving orange blossoms on the palate. This beer is light and pale in colour, and with a dry finish to help quench the summer heat's thirst.
[Food Pairing]
Oven baked zucchini stuffed with spiced lamb mince, deep fried herbed white fish, prawn and mango sweet and sour tacos
[Naming]
"Gensen" essentially means carefully selected, and it felt to us like a fitting name for this mini-series, all based upon carefully chosen or selected ingredients that we wanted to shine a spotlight on.
[Brewer's Voice]
When it came to crafting a beer to use with Shiga fresh hops, we needed to focus on giving the hops a stage in which they would shine. Fresh hops are meant to be fresh, and so we made sure that these hops were picked and brewed within 24hrs. Using wet hops quickly is critical to maintaining quality, as they begin to oxidize very rapidly at this stage.
As to the variety, we were offered Chinook. Chinook is an interesting hop, offering a variety of flavours and aromas depending greatly on where it was grown, and the weather conditions of that season. Knowing this, we wanted to give this beer a clean but simple malt base to really let the terroir of the Shiga grown hops come through. We used a blend of Maris Otter and wheat for the base, giving the beer a soft and light body with a bit of mouthfeel so as not to get in the way of the hop aromas. Fresh hops tend to give a bright floral character, with a slightly “greener” brightness. While this character is very pleasant in small amounts, in large amounts it can result in a vegetal-like character, and so to prevent this we limited the fresh hops to a large whirlpool addition, while pairing it with classic hop pellets throughout the rest of the brewing process. Some Centennial and Citra were used to boost the citrus peel and piney floral character of the fresh Chinook. We finished this beer out on the drier side using a neutral clean fermenting California ale strain of yeast. Fresh hop beers are a fun treat as you get a unique hop brightness that can only be achieved once a season.
Style: Fresh Hop IPA
Series: Nakama
Category: Beer
JAN: 4589718742786
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7.5
Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 7.5 | Flavor - 7.5 | Texture - 7 | Overall - 7.5
KBC Gensen Fresh Hop IPA 6%
Orange gold wort thick soapy off-white foam that doesn’t linger. The aroma is herbal and spicy. The flavor is green bitter vegetal hops, a touch of spice and herbs. Ok.
Tried
from Can
at
Kyoto Brewing Company
on 26 Oct 2025
at 12:25
7.5
Kyotolefty (15912) reviewed Gensen--Fresh Hop from Kyoto Brewing Company 5 months ago
Appearance - 8 | Aroma - 8 | Flavor - 7 | Texture - 8 | Overall - 7
Can from Isetan. Deep golden color. Low head. Big, fresh hop nose, dank, spicy, floral, with tropical fruits and also some noble notes. Spicy, herbal hop flavor, resiny, fresh, topical fruit. Quite herbacious and also bitter.
Tried
on 27 Aug 2025
at 13:17