Herds Will Roll Leads With Dolcita, a Hop Named Only Recently

Bolero Snort built this 6.7 percent hazy around Dolcita, a hop the brewery says it rarely gets to use. Motueka and Galaxy fill in the edges, and the brewery is calling the result a tropical fruit cocktail with a creamy finish.

Style: Hazy IPA
Release Date: 2026-09-23
ABV: 6.7%
Bolero Snort Brewery (Carlstadt, NJ)

The interesting hop in this beer is the one most drinkers will not recognize.

Bolero Snort Brewery has released Herds Will Roll, a 6.7 percent hazy IPA built on Dolcita, Motueka and Galaxy. Two of those three are established names in the style. The third is the reason the brewery wrote the announcement.

Dolcita is new. It was released commercially as HBC 1019, the product of a 2016 cross between two developmental lines at the Hop Breeding Company - the John I. Haas and Yakima Chief Ranches joint venture that also produced Citra and Mosaic. It sat under a number for years before it got a name, and supply for varieties at that stage of their life tends to be tight. Bolero Snort says it does not often get to use Dolcita, and calls working it into this beer a real treat.

What the hop is supposed to deliver is unusual enough to explain the enthusiasm. The brewery credits Dolcita with rich, ripe peach ring, candied pineapple and creamy coconut. That coconut note is the outlier. Stone fruit and tropical character are standard currency in a hazy IPA, but a creamy, confectionery finish is a less common thing to get out of a hop, and it lines up with how the variety has been described elsewhere.

The rest of the bill plays to type. Motueka, from New Zealand, leans bright and citric, with a lime-forward edge. Galaxy, from Australia, is the passionfruit hop, and it is presumably where the brewery's "punctuation of passionfruit" comes from. Between them the beer has an American newcomer, a New Zealand variety and an Australian one working the same tropical register from three directions.

Bolero Snort describes the overall result as a tropical fruit cocktail with notes of candied citrus and ripe peach rings, and says it drinks with a super creamy mouthfeel that is pillowy and soft on the palate. As with any tasting note supplied by the brewery, that is their read rather than a verdict.

The stated occasion is the beginning of fall, which puts Herds Will Roll somewhat against the season's usual run of marzen and dark lager. A tropical hazy is a fair counterweight to all of it, and the coconut-and-pineapple direction would hold up well against something off a grill while the weather still allows for one.

The name continues the cattle theme Bolero Snort has run since it began contract brewing in 2013. The brewery has operated its own Carlstadt, New Jersey facility since 2020, under the banner "Hoof Crafted Ales and Lagers."

Herds Will Roll is available now from the brewery's tasting room at 316 20th Street in Carlstadt.

Editor’s Take

Every so often a brewery tells you which hop it is actually excited about, and it is almost never the famous one. Bolero Snort has Galaxy in this beer - a hop that has headlined a thousand hazies and could have carried the whole announcement on its own - and instead the note the brewery stops to make is that it does not often get to use Dolcita. That is the tell. Galaxy is the reliable hire. Dolcita is the one they had to wait for.

And the flavor they credit it with is the genuinely odd part: peach rings and candied pineapple are ordinary enough for a hazy, but creamy coconut is not something a hop is usually asked to produce. It is closer to a dessert note than a beer one, and paired with the pillowy mouthfeel the brewery is describing, the whole thing starts to sound less like an IPA and more like something served in a tall glass with an umbrella in it. Brewed, per the brewery, to celebrate the beginning of fall. New Jersey in late September is welcome to be confused by that, and should probably drink one anyway.

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.