Name: Pineapple Hopper
Brewing Company: Wet Ticket Brewing Company
Location: Rahway, NJ
Style: IPA – Milkshake
ABV: 7%
“A balanced, sweet twist on the New Jersey brewery’s Flagship IPA.”
From Wet Ticket’s our beer page:
A Milkshake IPA featuring a subtle addition of vanilla and just enough pineapple to accentuate the tropical fruit hop flavor: Lush and creamy featuring layers of Pineapple, Vanilla and Citrus notes with just enough lactose to tie it all together.
From the untappd entry for the beer:
We’ve taken the Trolley Hopper off the tracks! Amping up the pineapple notes in the original with fresh pineapple juice from our friends at Rahway’s own Juice Hub, then conditioning it on milk sugar and Madagascar vanilla beans. To complete the package, the “Pineapple Hopper” was dry hopped with 06297 which very subtly complements the vanilla and adds just the right amount of hop flavor.
Milkshake IPAs…one of the more popular styles to emerge recently, some might say a cousin to or adjacent to New England IPAs, since both beers are hazy and often feature lactose as one of their adjunct ingredients. Technically this is the second Milkshake IPA to be reviewed, I say technically because the term “IPA – Milkshake” was barely a fully recognized style for that review back in 2018 (Bolero Snort’s BOVB (Blood Orange Cream Pop IPA)). Here we have Wet Ticket’s hazier take on their flagship Trolley Hopper NEIPA (which I reviewed about two years ago). Wet Ticket does a smart thing with this beer, something quite a few breweries have done: take a successful “brand” and spin off a variant. Does the theory work out in practice?
The addition of milk sugar (lactose), Madagascar Vanilla, and the Pineapple, which gives the beer its name, are three ingredients that have within them the potential to be overpowering on their own, so nuance and skill are required to blend those elements together. Fortunately, Tim Pewitt and his crew have that skill, nuance, and craft brewing experience to make this beer work very nicely.
The look test: Unsurprisingly, the beer pours very hazy and opaque in the glass. One could be forgiven for thinking the beer was actually a pineapple juice. The aroma is of hops and some pineapple.
The first sip: a very pleasant surprise. The surprises is just how well balanced the flavors are. There’s hit of pineapple, some vanilla, and hops; all as advertised. What becomes more evident is just how well made this beer is. Any one of the adjunct elements could be overpowering, but there’s great balance between the pineapple, vanilla, and milk sugar, and none of them outshine the hops.
I usually think of stouts as dessert beers, but Pineapple Hopper is a beer that work for that post dinner treat. That said, the sweetness is balanced enough and won’t overpower your palate for most meals. All told, Pineapple Hopper is a beer that shows Wet Ticket’s continued skill and excellence at craft brewing.
Recommended, link to Untappd 4-bottle cap rating.
The Tap Takeover 