East End Brewing has a line about this beer that works as its entire justification. It is the only seasonal the brewery can truly only make seasonally.

Everything else on a fall release calendar is a decision. This one is a deadline.

Big Hop Harvest is canned and heading to Larimer and Mt. Lebanon today, a wet hopped ale at 6.9 percent built on fresh local whole cones from Hop Stop Farm. The brewery says those cones have to be used as soon as possible once they come off the plant.

That is not a preference. Undried hops come out of the field carrying most of their original moisture, and they begin breaking down within hours of picking. The gap between the trellis and the kettle is the whole technique. Miss it and there is no beer, which is why wet hopped ales appear for a few weeks in September and then vanish until the next harvest.

East End also takes a moment to correct the record on the plant itself. Hops grow on a bine, not a vine. The difference is real: a bine climbs by wrapping its entire stem around a support, where a vine uses tendrils or suckers to grip.

What the fresh cones actually change

The brewery describes a nuanced, earthy hoppiness that stands apart from the pellets available year-round. There is a reasonable mechanism behind that claim.

Pellets are dried, milled and compressed, a process that concentrates hop resin and strips out most of the green, vegetal material along the way. Whole undried cones bring all of it into the kettle at once - water, chlorophyll, leaf matter. The grassy, earthy character wet hopped beers are known for comes from the parts of the plant that pelletizing is designed to remove.

The beer has collected some notice for it. USA Today's 10Best list voted Big Hop Harvest the best fall beer in America in both 2024 and 2025.

Draft is pouring in Larimer, with cans in both Larimer and Mt. Lebanon. The brewery says draft is heading to its other locations shortly.

Editor’s Take

Every brewery in America has a fall seasonal, and almost none of them are actually seasonal. A pumpkin ale is a decision somebody makes in a meeting. A marzen can be lagered in February and held. The calendar in craft beer has drifted so far from the harvest that you can buy Oktoberfest in July and nobody blinks. So there is something quietly satisfying about East End pointing at Big Hop Harvest and noting it is the only seasonal they can truly only make seasonally. Not for marketing reasons. For agricultural ones. The cones come off the bine wet and start dying immediately, and no amount of planning gets around that.

The parenthetical is the part I keep coming back to, though. Bine, not vine - the brewery took the trouble to correct you mid-sentence in a beer announcement. A bine climbs by winding its whole stem around whatever it can reach, no tendrils, no suckers, just brute rotational persistence. Which, for a plant that has to be picked and brewed inside a single afternoon, feels about right.

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.

The Hops in Big Hop Harvest Grow on a Bine, Not a Vine

East End cans its annual wet hopped ale today, built on whole cones from Hop Stop Farm and used within hours of picking. It is the one fall seasonal the brewery cannot make at any other time.

What the fresh cones actually change

Source & Editorial