Yards Brewing Company Cicada Indigenous Ale: A New Hop Variety taking on a Classic Beer Style

As I perused the shelves of my local beer shop (shout out to Norm’s Beer and Wine, they’ve got a great selection of beers and are my go to for my beers), the label of Yards Brewing Company’s Cicada caught my eye. I always love going to the beer store and just browsing beers just by looking at their labels. I usually go in having an idea of what I’m looking for, be it a new release or a certain style, but I almost always find myself being sidetracked, with a flashy or funky label drawing my attention. However, with Yard’s Cicada, I wasn’t drawn by the flashiness of the label. I was drawn by its simplistic and yet detailed nature, with its drawing of a cicada on a hop vine looking like something taken out of an 18th or 19th century science textbook. At the same time, the drawing of the cicada brought back memories of the last “invasion” of the red eyed beasts that took over my town during middle school as they made their emergence after seventeen years underground. But I digress.

Yard’s Cicada Indigenous Ale is a Belgian style India Pale Ale, which is brewed with “local wildflower honey, a classic Belgian yeast strain, and a hop variety so new it hasn’t been named yet.” In my last review, I looked at New Belgium’s French Aramis IPA, which also used a new hop variety: the Aramis hop. I chose that beer to review because I thought reviewing a beer with a new hop variety would be fun, but when I chose Yard’s Cicada, I had no idea they were using a new experimental hop variety. And I was pretty stoked to find that out. In my last post, I talked about how it is really cool brewers are using these new hop varieties in new beers, and I’m glad that I stumbled on another beer using a new variety (although I wish I had a little more information on the hop. Further research proved fruitless when I tried to glean any more information on this “new hop”).

Numbers-wise, this Belgian IPA comes in a 750mL bottle, and is 8.5% ABV. Watch out for the ABV, since this beer proved to be quite drinkable! Poured into a tumbler pint glass, this beer is as aesthetically pleasing as any.

Mugshots of Yards Brewing Company’s Cicada Belgian IPA

Appearance– The beer poured amber in color, tinged reddish-orange. A thick and luxurious tan head rushed to the top of the glass, creating a dense and frothy head that subsided over a few minutes, but never disappeared fully, with tiny bubbles of carbonation racing to the head as long as there was beer in the glass.

Aroma– The aroma of this IPA is decidedly one of floral hoppiness. It starts off with an earthy character, with a mild citrus undertone. It has an herbal character to it, but that takes a backseat along with the citrus aromas when compared to the floral notes. About halfway through the first glass, once the beer sits and warms up a bit, more citrusy aromas are released. There are also some malt aromas to the beer, which makes for a very interesting balancing act of malty and hoppy aromas, which is reflected also in the flavor profile of this IPA.

Taste– This IPA is very malt forward. It has a malty flavor which resides somewhere in between biscuit, roasty, and caramel in character. This maltiness is balanced out by bitter hop flavors that are mostly floral, with hints of citrus that are more apparent when the beer warms up a bit and settles. It finishes with an overall malty body with moderate hop bitterness. It has a surprisingly clean finish, where the hop bitterness doesn’t overpower and overstay its welcome. It does finish with a warm alcoholic bite, but that is to be expected from the addition of the wildflower honey, packing in an 8.5% ABV.

Mouthfeel– Lots of carbonation, but not overly carbed, giving it a full body without being thick. The beer has a warm alcohol mouthfeel to it, but it is a pleasant sensation that accentuates the malt backbone. It finishes dry, which makes it a really drinkable beer. Which is great if you are wary of its 8.5% ABV.

Overall Impression– Yards Brewing Company’s Cicada is a solid Belgian IPA. It has a flavor profile that is well balanced: malty, roasty-biscuit flavors balancing out a hop bitterness that is driven by floral and earthy flavors, with an underlying citrus hoppiness. It finishes dry, with a hop bitterness that is to be expected from an IPA, but it isn’t so overly bitter that you can’t taste the next sip through a residual drowning hop bitterness. For an IPA, it is definitely malt forward, and it is a good example of the style of the Belgian IPA.

For being an impulse buy based mostly off of the label, I am pretty happy with picking up this bottle of Yards Brewing Company’s Cicada Indigenous Ale. Established in 1994, the guys at Yards are brewing some solid beers. This Belgian IPA, which I personally think is an interesting style to begin with, is a really great beer to drink. It makes use of a “classic Belgian yeast strain,” which reflects traditional Belgian brewing culture, “indigenous wildflower honey” which adds an American spin on a Continental style, and a “new experimental hop variety,” which reflects the innovation and experimentation that craft brewers are embracing in order to create new and engaging beers that consumers are going to be eager to try. And on top of all of this, Yards Brewing Company is Pennsylvania’s first 100% wind powered brewery, and works to reduce its environmental footprint in its brewing processes. So when you’re supporting them, you’re supporting Mother Nature! What’s not to like about that?

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