Mountain Culture pioneers world-first brewing technique they’ve called Microdosing

The craft brewery has released the first of a four-part series of beers that pioneers a brand newbrewing technique, “Microdosing”, where small hop additions are added many times throughoutthe brewing process.

Co-founder and Head Brewer of Mountain Culture explains: “Usually when we brew, there’ll be a couple of big hop additions, one in the brewing process and then one during fermentation (or maybe two in a double dry hop beer).

“For these hop additions, we’ll usually only combine a maximum of two different hops to createthe flavour we’re going for, but for our microdosed beers, we’ve turned all that on its head,” hesaid.

“Firstly, for each of the four beers, we’ve created our own Mountain Culture Hop Blends bycombining at least four different types of hops.

“Then, we’ve added small doses of said blends at lots of different times during the brewingprocess, mostly during fermentation.

“This means that when the hops go into the beer, they’re being activated with different pHvalues because of where the beer is at, and also different levels of yeast activity throughoutfermentation. This, theoretically, strips different flavours and characteristics from the hop pellet,”he said.

For the four-part series, Mountain Culture has used two different house yeast strains but keptthe alcohol percentage for all the same at 10%ABV.

“10% is high, but we chose 10% because it means we can use a really large quantity of hops tomake their contribution and the flavours they impart really impactful, without coming across in aharsh or astringent way,” said McCready.

Given this is an experiment, McCready wasn’t exactly sure what the result would be but early feedback from drinkers of their first release – a 10% West Coast IPA called Psychonaut – has been really positive with many reporting enhanced flavours and aromas.

“We’ve always said that we are a brewery committed to pushing the boundaries of beer and that has to include a high level of experimentation. Does it always pay off? No. But in this case, we’re all really stoked with the results of microdosing, and excited to keep refining our techniques so that microdosing can become part of our normal brewing process,” said McCready.

There will be three further microdosed beers released on the next three Thursdays, including a NEIPA and an Oat Cream IPA.