Name: Working Capital
Brand: Corporate Ladder Brewing Company
Availability: InStock

Four hop entries, two hop varieties: Corporate Ladder Brewing Company built Working Capital on Citra and Nelson, then used each of them twice in two different physical forms.

The can lists the beer as a double dry hopped India pale ale with Citra Dynaboost, Nelson, Nelson Hyperboost and Citra. The newsletter files it as a hazy IPA at 7 percent, out now in 16 ounce four-packs.

Dynaboost and Hyperboost are not hop varieties. They are advanced hop products from Yakima Chief Hops, flowable extracts pulled out of hop pellets with carbon dioxide and standardized to a fixed oil content. Brewers dose them into the whirlpool in place of some or all of the pellet charge they would otherwise use.

Two things follow from that. The first is aroma, since an extract carries far more hop oil per unit of weight than a pellet does, so a brewer can push aromatics up without adding more plant matter to the tank. The second is yield, which is the less romantic half of the pitch. Hop pellets soak up beer. Every kilogram of hop material in a whirlpool takes finished wort with it when the tank is dumped, and swapping part of that charge for a flowable extract leaves more beer behind at the end.

Citra and Nelson

The two varieties underneath all of this have a clear division of labour.

Citra is the tropical citrus workhorse of the American hazy IPA and needs no introduction in the style. Nelson Sauvin is the outlier. It is a New Zealand hop named for the Nelson region and for its resemblance to sauvignon blanc, and it brings white grape, gooseberry and a dry, flinty edge that runs against Citra's sweetness rather than alongside it. Corporate Ladder's tap list gets more specific still, naming Freestyle as the grower behind the Nelson Sauvin.

Doubling both varieties means neither is playing a supporting part. This would sit well next to something with a bit of salt and fat to it, fried chicken or a sharp cheddar, where the Nelson has something to cut through.

Working Capital is available in 16 ounce four-packs with online ordering for pickup at the Palmetto taproom, and it is pouring on the brewery's current tap list.

Editor’s Take

Somebody at Corporate Ladder has a sense of humour that operates several layers down. Working capital, in the finance sense, is the money a business has tied up in the things it needs to keep running - the inventory in the warehouse, the beer in the tank. And one of the quiet selling points of a flowable hop extract is that it does not soak up your beer the way a whirlpool packed with pellets does. Less product lost to the hop bed, more beer out the door. I have no evidence the pun was deliberate. I refuse to believe it was not.

The hop list rewards a stare, because it reads like a stutter: Citra Dynaboost, Nelson, Nelson Hyperboost, Citra. Two varieties, each turning up twice in different physical states, like a guest list where half the names are the same people in different coats. It is a completely sensible way to build a hop bill - extract in the whirlpool for aroma, pellets for the rest of the job - but printed along the bottom of a can it reads like a typo that turns out to be a recipe.

Source & Editorial

JollyPint independently prepares release articles using information published by breweries through newsletters, websites, and other official public communications. Brewery-supplied descriptions and tasting notes are reported as provided, while editorial context is added by JollyPint.

Working Capital Runs Citra and Nelson in Two Forms Each

Corporate Ladder's new hazy IPA lists four hops on the can and uses only two varieties. Citra and Nelson each turn up twice, once as a whirlpool extract and once in the usual pellet form.

Citra and Nelson

Source & Editorial