Colonial Brewing Co’s first new release of 2021 is the Gone Green Double IPA (8.2%) – a fitting tribute to the fact they recently installed 100kW of solar panels on their Port Melbourne roof.
The panels were installed to reduce their energy consumption and emissions and generate enough to power the entire brewery when the sun is shining.
Similarly powerful, Gone Green is the hoppiest beer Colonial have canned to date, using 20g of hops per litre.
“One of the champion hops used was New Zealand Rakau giving Gone Green a luscious stone fruit character, with bitter resin and citrus flavours from US Amarillo and Simcoe hops,” CBCo brewer Dion Jackson said.
“The hefty bitterness of Gone Green is balanced by malt sweetness creating a considered IIPA that explodes with citrus and tropical notes.”
The release is also the winning result of an in-house brewing competition to celebrate the installation of the solar panels. The brewery crew split in half and brewed two different beers – a Red IPA and a IIPA – on their 100 litre pilot system that was built as a lockdown project last year.
Colonial said both were solid beers but chose the IIPA because it was more suited to the time of year and the mix of classic US hops and New Zealand Rakau was really unique.
Gone Green was released on Monday (February 15). Find its stockists here.