Even though the weather can change rapidly almost any time of year around Atlanta, spring is often the most volatile season, going from the cool and rainy remnants of winter to the hot and humid harbingers of summer in a matter of hours.
When it comes to spring beers, traditional lighter styles like German Maibock have given way to a potpourri of offerings that seem to suddenly appear like wildflowers. Here are a few of the latest crop from Georgia’s craft breweries.
At the top of the list, Athens’ Creature Comforts recently released the third version of Athena Paradiso, a series that imparts fruity flavors to its popular year-round Athena Berliner Weisse kettle sour.
The new edition uses a blend of tart cherries, raspberries and cranberries, with 2,856 pounds of puree added to each batch during the fermentation process. The fruit plays against the acidity of the Athena base and turns the beer a distinctive dark pink.
On the horizon, Cosmik Debris, Creature Comforts’ wildly popular spring seasonal double IPA, will return on draft in early March and in cans later in the month. Look for a different mix of hops in this year’s version, but expect a signature soft, balanced flavor profile.
Atlanta’s Red Brick has three beers out in March, including the renamed and remade Laughing Skull Craft Lager, a light, easy drinking beer that has turned up in various guises during the brewery’s history.
Also out this month is Belgian-Style Wheat, a light spring-through-summer seasonal brewed with hibiscus flowers, sweet orange peel and a touch of cinnamon. And Grapefruit Hoplanta, a grapefruit juice-flavored version of the brewery’s flagship Hoplanta IPA, is scheduled to be on tap as a draft-only release this month.
The spring seasonal, draft-only release from Atlanta’s Second Self is Citrus IPA. It’s brewed with citrus-forward Columbus, Amarillo and Citra hops, flavored with lemon, orange and grapefruit peel, then dry-hopped with more Amarillo hops.
Atlanta’s Sweetwater has a brand-new spring seasonal, Hash Session IPA, that hit shelves in February. It’s the brewery’s first session IPA. But it’s the third release using hop hash, made from the concentrated resins left over after hops are formed into pellets for brewing. This Amarillo hop version of hop hash comes with a pungent mix of floral and tropical citrus fruit flavors.
Last but not least, Athens’ Terrapin is out with its new Hop Selection, a strong, single-hopped imperial IPA that celebrates the brewery’s favorite hop selection from the current harvest. This time, it’s an Australian variety, known as Vic Secret, which imparts favors and aromas of pineapple, passion fruit and pine.
And if you’re planning to make it to Terrapin’s 14th anniversary celebration on April 9, you can sample the brewery’s first sour beer, Tart Belgian Red, soured with lactobacillus and fermented with Chimay yeast. And you can find several different Terrapin Hi-5 IPA casks at the festival, each blended with a different type of fruit.
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