Yazoo Brewing Company - Calla

Hazy IPAs are all the rage these days, and Yazoo offers up another interpretation with their Calla IPA featuring a pair of lesser-known hop varieties. On the pour, we get a well-hazed vibrant yellowy golden color capped by pale foam. An inviting aroma issues notes of fresh citrus tending toward tangerine backed up by milder grapefruit and hints of lemon-lime. Look for some grassy tones here too, amidst some herbal, spicy flourishes. The aroma profile manifests itself well in the flavor department too, with plenty of juicy and zesty citrus, including that lemon-lime note which builds to a bit more prominence. Sabro hops lend a minty quality to this brew; look for a cooling herbal impression amidst the grassy and spicy overtones here. Look also for some touches of passion fruit and flashes of berry. The perceived hop bitterness is firm, but doesn’t approach the big IBU figure on our spec sheet, and the overall impression is nicley balanced with plenty of dryness but also a lingering dash of sweetness. Malts add a lightly bready, biscuity base, with the oats contributing to a smooth and creamy body in addition to the hazy look, leading to a satisfying feel despite the generally nimble impression and sessionable ABV. Cheers!

Yazoo Brewing Co.’s founder and brewer, Linus Hall, got his brewing start in a familiar fashion, purchasing a homebrewing kit from an ad in the back pages of Rolling Stone back in 1993. Linus was, as he phrased it, “a cash-poor college student living in an old farmhouse in Virginia, and brewing my own beer seemed a little less illegal than the pot-growing operation my other housemates were involved in.” We’re typing this from California; we get where he’s coming from. His homebrewing habit continued after moving with his wife Lila back to Mississippi following college, and when the couple relocated to Nashville in 1996.

Fast-forward a bit, and Yazoo Brewing Co. opened up in Nashville in October of 2003, with a keg-only lineup of staple beers like Yazoo Pale Ale, Spring Wheat, Dos Perros, and Onward Stout. They quickly established strong local support for their draft beer, and their Hefeweizen entered regular rotation after picking up a gold medal at the Great American Beer Festival in 2004, just a year after Yazoo opened.

In only six years Yazoo outgrew its initial home base, and 2010 brought the purchase of a new brewing facility (including a 40-barrel brewhouse) in The Gulch, a historic neighborhood in Nashville between Music Row and downtown. If you’re in the Nashville area, be sure to swing by Yazoo’s latest taproom location—which they just moved into a few years ago. Having outgrown their downtown Nashville spot, they recently built their own facility in Madison, Tennessee, about 15 minutes away, on a 7-acre plot nestled along on the Cumberland River. The new place has got way more parking and great views from the patio. Learn more at yazoobrew.com.