New IPA Series 2023 「六人の変革者 - 6 Innovators -」
This year, we are introducing a new IPA series, which is our “6 Innovators” series.
In 2021, we refined our year-round beers and redefined our series lineups, which we then refined last year. We are currently very happy with our series lineup, but there is one series that we have only created as a one-off special IPA exploration series for the year. In 2021, it was our Six Tastes series, using the 6 different tastes that humans can perceive through the lens of the IPA style. Last year, it was Six Journeys, focused on imagining what the modern IPA might be had it started now in a different country to America, where the modern craze came from. Read about last year’s series here: https://kyotobrewing.com/en/blogs/kbc-blog/new-series-2022-6journeys
This time around, we decided to look at the history of the style that, one could argue, was responsible for making the entire craft beer movement a reality. As with many world-shifting trends, this was created by a handful of people who bent or broke the rules and set a new course. Naturally, the creation of something may not be solely down to an individual, but we decided to picture 6 different beers that shifted the course for this iconic style, and craft beer in general.
Our first in this series is our “Creator” IPA. Anyone work works in craft beer knows the story of the IPA’s beginnings. Created in imperial-era England, overseas officers in India wanted to drink beer, but getting beer to India by boat took a long time. Most low alcohol pale ales would perish and become, one would imagine, highly unpleasant. Over time, and presumably by accident, it was found that adding more hops to the beer, in addition to being higher in alcohol, would help keep the taste fresher, or at least allow it to age in a more palatable manner. So what would this beer be like? While recreating 100% is nowadays difficult for many reasons (differences in hop production, modern equipment, health regulations, etc.), we have attempted to make a delicious beer that can be an homage to the style’s historical beginnings. Keep an eye out for the beer preview and release posts on our Facebook and Instagram, and look forward to the other 5 key figures in this series! Cheers!