Back in February of this year, at about the time when most beer geeks were embroiled in endless discussion of what does and does not constitute a brewery’s “flagship,” I started thinking about Chicago’s Half Acre Beer Co.
Half Acre has been one of my favorite breweries for a long time. They were part of Chicago’s “second wave” craft beer boom in the late 2000s, opening in the same time frame as the contemporaries to which they’ll always be compared, such as the very successful Revolution Brewing. Not every brewery of that era made it to today, but the cream undoubtedly rose to the top, and the original Half Acre tasting room became my favorite place to visit whenever I was in the city. In particular, no one in Chicago was doing hoppy beer styles with more verve or panache than Half Acre in the late 2000s and early 2010s.
Much of the brewery’s growth, though, was on the back of its flagship pale ale, Daisy Cutter, rather than what might be more expected for a brewery with a mastery over hops—a full-on IPA. Part of that was due to Daisy Cutter’s assertiveness—it was one of those pale ales that stretched the boundaries of the style in the direction of IPA to begin with. But with that said, Half Acre did produce IPAs very often—just never a year-round variety. Memorably, there was “Heyoka” IPA, which won a silver medal at GABF back in 2013, declaring Half Acre as an ascendant craft brewery in the competition’s most hotly contested category. But then things got confusing—members of the native American Lakota people contested the use of the name, which led to the beer becoming “Senita.” But that name didn’t stick either, leading to the third and final iteration of the beer, which is “Goneaway.” Did it steal a little bit of the beer’s thunder? Perhaps, but even though Goneaway was never year-round, most drinkers probably felt it was the closest thing to a year-round IPA for Half Acre, even when it was alternating with other IPAs such as Half Acre’s Vallejo.
Now, though, it would seem the time has finally come for a proper coronation. More than a decade after they started brewing, Half Acre has hit upon an IPA recipe they feel is worthy of full-time status. That beer is the brand-new Bodem IPA.
And to be perfectly honest … I was actually a little concerned, after reading some quotes from head brewer Matt Gallagher, describing Bodem. In a piece with the Chicago Tribune, Gallagher describes the beer as “a response to where drinkers are” right now, seeming to suggest that the brewery was perhaps altering its house style or philosophy to cater to drinkers who now tend to be overwhelmingly chasing after dense, chewy, sweet, positively desserty IPAs. This was concerning, to say the least, as Half Acre has remained one of the best producers of drier, clearer IPAs in recent years—in fact, their clear Beer Hates Astronauts IPA finished at #15 out of 324 IPAs when we last blind-tasted the style, one of only a handful of non-hazy IPAs to crack the top 25. To read Gallagher say “Honestly, we were looking for something sweeter and more full,” I worried that Half Acre would become the latest in a series of great hoppy breweries attempting to replicate a style that not everyone can/should be trying to produce.
I will fully admit, then, that after tasting Bodem, it’s clear I was wrong to doubt. I should have paid more attention when Gallagher stressed that Bodem IPA was still “rooted in how we do things,” because the beer is a clear expression of the balance and hoppy clarity that has always made Half Acre a great brewer of pale ales and IPAs. Its label contains the words “in the past” and “in the future” for a reason—it is a true stylistic middle ground, and very fun to drink.