Mills Fresh Hop

The third edition of our wet-hopped beer. Fresh Hop was made from a blend of spontaneously fermented one, two, and five year old delicately flavoured pale beers. Fermentation took place in old French oak barrels.

On Tuesday 16th September 2025, we drove an hour north to visit hop merchants Charles Faram. We collected ten kilograms of Pilgrim hops which had been picked that morning. The beer was blended onto the hops later that afternoon, while the hops were at their absolute freshest.

Bottling took place the next day to ensure we only extracted the most desirable aromatics. Longer steep times extract more, but not necessarily better flavours. Pilgrim is an intruiging hop (giving notes of spice, cedar, and honey), which adds wonderfully to the complexities of our spontaneous fermentations. I am a great fan of hop flavours that are hard to pin down with simple descriptors.

The finished beer conditioned in bottle for a (relatively) brief three months before release, to allow enjoyment of the fresh hop flavours. As with all our dry-hopped beers, these aromatics will evolve quite dramatically over time.