Winning a medal at the World Beer Cup is the kind of thing a brewery can talk about forever, and Icicle Brewing Company has earned the right to do exactly that with Cloud Piercer. This hazy IPA took home bronze at the 2026 World Beer Cup, and the folks in Leavenworth liked it so much they went ahead and brewed up a fresh batch rather than letting it become a one-and-done trophy beer.
The hop bill here leans on Superdelic, a variety out of New Zealand that is not exactly a household name yet but delivers the kind of intense tropical fruit candy, ripe mango, and punchy citrus that hazy IPA fans go looking for. It comes together in a smooth, medium-bodied package, the sort of beer that manages to be aromatic without tipping over into overwhelming, which is a harder trick to pull off than it sounds.
Icicle Brewing has a slightly unusual origin story for a beer company. Founders Pam and Oliver Brulotte first moved to Leavenworth back in 2001, not to open a brewery, but to run Munchen Haus, a Bavarian grill and beer garden fitting right into the town's famously Bavarian-themed downtown. It took nearly a decade before they decided the town needed a brewery of its own, finally opening Icicle's doors in 2011. Oliver's family, as it happens, has been in the hop farming business for five generations, which probably explains why hop selection has always been something of a specialty here rather than an afterthought.
Cloud Piercer's can art leans into the same mountain scenery that gives the brewery its name, all jagged peaks and dramatic purple clouds, which fits a beer that has genuinely earned its "limited release" label. This new batch will be rolling out across Washington on draft and in 4-packs of 16oz cans, so keep an eye on the brewery's beer finder if your usual spot has not restocked yet.
For a brewery built on the idea that a small Bavarian-style mountain town deserved a proper hazy IPA of its own, Cloud Piercer is about as strong a proof of concept as you could ask for. Bronze medal or not, this is a beer worth tracking down.