Mikkeller Hop Series Challenger
This beer is a part of a Single Hop IPA series by Mikkeller. We created this series to showcase hop varieties on their own. This gives the consumer the possibility of smelling and tasting the unique characteristics of each variety and hopefully helping to educate people about the wonderful world of hops. For each beer, the single hop variety was used in the same weight for bittering, aroma and flavor and for dry hopping. All 19 varieties of single hop beers in this series were brewed the same week and with malts from the same batches and the same yeast and fermentation temperatures. This is done to better compare the characteristics of the different hop varieties.
3.3
212 reviews
Copenhagen, Denmark
Community reviews
Botella de 33 cl en casa, de 2d2dspuma. Mayo de 2013. Otro lúpulo de la serie Mikkeller. Cuerpo medio que se bebe muy bien con aromas y sabores algo florales y dulces. No muy amargo Bueno, para repetir.
Nose is bread, a little Belgian yeast, soft fruit. Taste is strawberry, peach through bread to a bitter slightly resin finish. Interesting use of challenger.
Bottle from Erzbierschof / Hazy amber color, decent creamy offwhite head, good lacing and lasting / Aroma is caramel, little bit citrusy, not a lot of hops in the nose, spicy / Flavor is caramel, malty more than others in this series, hints of citrus / Medium body, medium bitterness, good carbonation, medium citrusy finish / hops is not really present, disappointed
51 theoretical IBU. Pours a translucent copper from the bottle with bubbly off-white head that dissipates to leave good lace. Aroma is malty sweetness, caramel and pils, slight bread on the back end. Taste follows, the hops have definitely fallen off. Easy to drink, good carbonation. Definitely not fresh, but interesting concept.
Cloudy and dark amber with a tight bubble medium head. Aroma is nice a good mix of hops and malt. Very good flavors and very complex all the normal flavors citrus and pine but the a butterscotch like flavor that is very unique.
I was looking forward to Trying Mikkeler, since it gets so many praises of being good and innovative brewer. I was excited to find It’s Hop Series at a reasonable price. Unfortunately my anticipation and excitement was not matched by high standards that everyone praises Mikkeller to live by. Everyone in supply chain is to blame… Mikkeller does not have production dates, Distributor Trying to sell the product no matter what, Binny’s not having balls to stand up to its supplier and let them know that it is out of date and no good. I was pissed… All of them were old and stale, therefore complete waste of time and money. Every time I come across bad batch I swear to stop buying anything that has no dates… I just might do that, since there are plenty of other choices… Going Back to Mikkeller Hop Series… All of them Poured A Shade Lighter Or A Shade Darker of Muddy Brown. All of them Had Smaller or Larger Floaters. Huge Head, Decent Lacing. Earthy, Stale Hops Aroma. Tasted pretty much the same: Earthy, Malt, Stale Hops. Moderate Bitter Finish… Pass It Unless You Know It Is Fresh…
Bottle. Last bottle on the shelve for this retired beer. Dark golden color, slightly hazy. Medium head. Taste is typical IPA, except, the aftertaste is not as bitter. Nice aroma, citrus, grapefruit.
Bottle from Vino Wines. Hazy amber body with a thin off-white head that slowly fades. Muted aroma of earth, caramel, and orange. Flavour of pine, citrus and yeast. Medium body with an oily texture. Soft carbonation. A dull, one-dimensional, faded hop - a far cry from the brightness and clarity of the Simcoe and Columbus single-hop IPAs.
Nice bready aroma, syrup like, quite cloudy, nice biscuit like finish, ok but not amazing.
Bottle at Five Points Brewery, Hackney.
Poured a slightly hazy light amber with a thin off white head. Aroma of citrus, caramel and sweetened orange peal. Hop resin flavours with brown sugar and syrupy tinned fruit. Nice finish of ripe grapefruit, yeast and bready malts.
Aroma: Lychee, Malty, Honey, Lemon, Grapefruit.
Appearance: Rich amber, tints of red, Hazy. Dark for style. Off-white thin head.
Taste: Spicy, markedly bitter, hints of lemon and grapefruit. Minimal to no malt characteristic.
Palate: Light, thin, slight oiliness, medium carbonation. Lasting bitter finish.
Overall: Delicious aroma, not matched by the beer itself. However, more a useful experiment than a beer.
33 cl bottle.
Pours hazy orange color with a large head. Aroma of sweet fruits, some caramel malts, mild pine needle notes and hops. Flavor of goose berries, resiny hops, caramel malts and mild yeast notes, some apricot on the aftertaste. Medium to strong carbonation, somewhat bitter fruity palate. Decent.
3414
Re-rate with another 330ml bottle, this time all to myself rather than a tasting. Got a lot more earthy bitterness this time with some additional tickling citrus. Very nice indeed.
330ml bottle as part of a 5 bottle tasting. Pours deep amber with fragrant butterscotch and a hint of orange, with some spice and bitterness on the finish.
33cl bottle. murdy orange light brown with huge head. malty aroma with alcohol. taste is bitter with some fruit and a dry mouthfeel. there are better beers in this series.
Bottle from Kihoskh enjoyed at home
Orange hazy, big beige head. Smells of strawberries, apple, citrus zests and some malts. Moderate sweet, quite malty, the hop has some spice influence as well. Medium bitter finish, quite lots of green grass and herbs with a touch of resins
Bottle the five point brewery. Faint citrus chive aroma. Dirty bitter flavour with faint orange. Bready malt and higher alcohol.
from Erzbierschof - cloudy dark blond-orange beer with a moderate foam left; hoppy aroma of quince and spices; a good malt backbone, a bit fizzy on the tongue; some earthiness and a late yet well-present bitterness; the spicyness dominates the finish in a quite long hoppy finish - balanced and very pleasant
33 cl. bottle. Dark amber color with a short white head. Good retention and lacing. Mild on the IPA aromas and flavors. A bit of hops on the finish,
Bottle from Beer Cartel. Hazy amber/brown, smallish head disappeared quickly, strong caramel/malt, not much hop aroma coming through, little bit spicy, some floral/fruity (black currant?), very sweet, mild bitterness. Nice, but not my favourite Mikkeller Single Hop.
Big beer. Dark pour. White pour. Pretty good beer. Not bad. Pretty good I'd have it agoaib
Hazy brown light pour.. meh on taste..dead fruit. Pretty ddecent..not my fav mikkeller...
Aroma is mild fruity, Orange, pineapple, slightly yeasty. App-cloudy Orange, a lot of sediment large white globules. Small creamy head. very refreshing. Alcohol is well mask. Light taste with a creamy finish. Smooth light feel, very nice to drink. Carcobation is low for an IPA, but this beer feels good. A nice Ipa.
light beige head that slowly disappears, good lacing. hazelnut brown somewhat cloudy. malty, yeasty, hoppy and spicy aroma. spicy flavour followed by a bitterness and caramel. long soft bitter aftertaste with some nut-like taste. medium body and medium carbonation. quite good but not my favorite in the series. bottle 33cl
33cl Bottle. Blind tasting of all 19 Mikkeller Hop Series beers. Shared with Mathieu87.
Appearance: amber beer, stable white head.
Nose: Sugar, caramel even.
Taste: a full all round sweetness, i think this hop can bring a very good balance in a beer.
Bottle at home in London. Pours mostly clear caramel-gold with a large, off-white foam head. Toasted pine in the nose, light brown sugar, brown bread. Light to medium sweet flavor, crunchy leaves, brown sugar, dried out pine. Medium bodied average carbonation. Bitter leaves to finish, further brown sugar notes, brown bread. Seems a bit faded.
Fra flaske på Humle i Annen mars-13: Nr. 17, og flere i panelet har kastet inn glasset og forlatt åstedet. Ovesen & jeg holder stand! Bitter (tross kun 38 IBU som var en av kveldens laveste), men deilig. Fruktig og god. Fikk først en stjerne i margen, men den ble strøket. hvorfor husker jeg ikke...
Nose is toasted, caramel and some pine. Taste is fruity and buttery. (From tasting of all Hop series Cardinal 11. March)
Bottle (discounted) from Five Points Bottle Shop (Lumpkin St.) in Athens. Yeast, sugar, butter, and very little hops in the aroma. Deep copper color, huge (4-5cm) head, very rocky. Minor malty initial / mid has some caramel and rust / fairly clean finish, and aftertaste has little knife edges of menthol. Thin-medium body. Okay. Not quite what I was expecting. Very little hop presence. Maybe a bit too old, since I see that the first reviews of this beer date from about two years ago. BTW, this beer should be listed on RB in the "Mikkeller Single Hop" group
33cl bottle, Geers. - 4 or 5 experiments in, this Single hop series is beginning to delve its way in my long-term interests (and also: finances). Willamette, Cluster and Galena we the mysterious ones I got hold of first, and pretty much all flew below the radar of the more pronounced blended aromas of my favourite UK and US (I)PAs. This is the first one to make a bold, if expectedly unidirectional impression: aroma is rather contained and earthy, the hop flavours are earthy, zesty spice and above all thick fruity caramels like in a solid traditionally British pale ale. What impresses me most about this example is how well the full malt base (feature of the whole series) backs up and works in accord with this ESB hop.
Nice to sample this series haphazardly and in very broad intervals: now only to come across the remaining contingent (and a budget to match) ...
Showcasing the Challenger variety, this beer has a cloudy, murky appearance with a bright orange color and a cream-colored head. It has an almost perfumy aroma, piney and spicy. This is really, really nice. Compared to other varieties of the Hop Series, the use of Challenger hops almost give the beer a thinner-feeling body. Bitterness is bold in the finish. It’s green, spicy, and delightfully bittersweet!