Other Half Southernhopalistic IPA

There was a point where every beer fridge in the world seemed to contain a cloudy yellow can with “double dry hopped” written on it in increasingly alarming fonts. Other Half Brewing helped push that whole thing into the mainstream, although to their credit they were doing it before the haze arms race became completely exhausting.

Founded in Brooklyn in 2014, the brewery built its reputation on soft, saturated New England style IPAs loaded with Citra, Mosaic, Galaxy and whatever else was capable of making a room smell faintly of mango smoothies and hop pellets. The beers tend to arrive with names that sound either mildly threatening or like rejected skate videos, which feels about right for modern American craft beer.

What makes Other Half interesting is that beneath all the hype, the beers are usually very well put together. The big DIPAs still carry bitterness. The oats and wheat add texture without turning everything into fruit soup. Even the pastry stouts, which can often feel like somebody dissolved a dessert trolley into a fermenter, usually keep some balance. Their lager programme deserves more attention too, especially from people who think the brewery only deals in 8% hop saturation.

A lot of modern UK and European breweries owe at least a quiet nod in their direction. You can trace a fairly direct line from Other Half to the current obsession with intensely aromatic pale beer, heavy dry hopping and can art that looks like it escaped from an underground comic shop. Some breweries copied the look without understanding the structure underneath. That happens.

At their best, the beers manage to feel both ridiculously expressive and strangely drinkable. There’s usually plenty of peach, pineapple, orange rind and soft tropical fruit, but also enough bitterness and texture to stop things collapsing into sugar water. That balance is harder than it looks after the third dry hop addition and the fifth Untappd check-in of the day.