A fifth edition of special beer made from fresh hops is heading to the market

A fifth batch of special beer made from fresh hops has matured in Budweiser Budvar Brewery’s lager cellar. The beer specialty was brewed on the 29th August last year using freshly harvested hop cones of Saaz “poloraný červeňák”. The limited BUD edition with the gravity of 16° and 7.6% ABV contains live yeasts. This extraordinary beer is now available in selected restaurants in the Czech Republic as well as other six countries.

A historically fifth batch of special beer brewed using fresh hop cones has matured in Budweiser Budvar Brewery’s lager cellar. Under the name of “BUD B: STRONG”, this exceptional beer is now heading to several hundred restaurants in the Czech Republic and six other countries as well. Since 2012, the limited edition made from fresh hops has been brewed in Budweiser Budvar only once a year - always in the time of culminating hop harvest. Fresh hop cones rank amongst the rarest brewing ingredients, as they must be processed instantly after their harvest, therefore on the same day they were picked. For that reason they are only used infrequently in brewing.  

“Beer hopped solely and absolutely by Czech hops can only be brewed by a brewery whose brewing house is equipped with a so-called ‘hop strainer”, which removes the extracted grains from the hopped wort at the end of the hop boiling. We have such equipment, being one of the few Czech breweries, since we brew using dried hops all year round,” says Budweiser Budvar’s brewmaster Adam Brož, Ph.D., MBA. If a brewery has no such “hop strainer” installed, the hop cones can only be used as a small addition, while most of the hops must be supplied in a form of pellets or extracts.  

The beer batch that consumers can now savour was brewed on the 29th August 2016 using freshly harvested hop cones of Saaz “poloraný červeňák”. The hops had been grown on the “Splav” hop field, which belongs to the famous locality of the “Golden Stream Valley” in the cadastre of the hop-growing municipality of Blšany. “Last year's weather was very favourable for hops, as the rainfall and sunshine kept coming at the right time. As opposed to the 2015 harvest, the hops from the “Splav” hop field contained about 30% more bitter substances. This year's edition is therefore of a greater bitterness than last year’s one. Its delicacy and the rich aroma of Saaz hops amazingly stand out yet again. As BUD B: STRONG contains live yeast, the sensory experience when drinking is enriched by a subtle yeasty flavour, a typical aroma and characteristic haze,” explains Adam Brož.

The limited edition of BUD B:STRONG has a 16° gravity and 7.6% ABV. The beer is consumed from 0.3 litre goblets. Due to its content of live yeast, BUD from fresh hops is only available in selected restaurants that are capable of storing, treating and tapping the beer well, as well as carrying out proper sanitation of the tapping systems. Nowadays, the beer from fresh hops is tapped in the Masné krámy restaurant, branded Budvarka Beer Restaurants and several other restaurants across the country. Besides the Czech Republic, the limited edition is going to be sold in Italy, Germany, Russia, Slovakia, Sweden and the UK.