(Portsmouth, NH) – Here is the latest from Smuttynose Brewing.

Today’s newsletter was packed with a ton of updates on all things Smuttynose and Portsmouth Brewery. Below is an excerpt of just the Homunculus part. Also of note, Smuttynose has turned to Matt Brewing to help out with production of Old Brown Dog. And… “a sizeable portion of 2011’s Pumpkin Ale will come from Matt’s copper brewhouse. Pumpkin Ale should begin arriving in stores in mid to late July.”

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Our newest Big Beer release, Homunculus, is also the first beer brewed in our Short Batch series as well as the first beer to get promoted to a 22-ounce bottle.

Like the label text says above, Homunculus is a hoppy Belgian-style golden ale. A special Belgian abbey yeast left an alcohol content of 9.9% abv. The grain bill is very simple: 2-Row, Weyermann Carahell, and some cane sugar to lighten the body. Bravo hops are exclusively used for a moderately aggressive 45 IBUs while all the late boil additions are Sterling.

So far so good, but Homunculus’ real moxie comes from its dryhopping. We infused 150 barrels (4650 gallons) with 176 pounds of Nugget hops and 264 pounds of Sterling hops. That’s nearly 3 pounds of hops per barrel of beer! It’s safe to say that you can expect an aroma explosion when you finally get some in your glass.

What is a Homunculus? There are several different definitions that come from psychology, alchemy, and preformation. The word itself is Latin for, “little human.” As you can see from the label art, we were captivated by the preformationist usage of the term. The name was discovered during a brainstorming session. We didn’t want to call the scaled up brew by its original name, so out came the thesaurus. We saw “homunculus” was a synonym for “gnome” and the rest, as they say, was history.

We’ll be shipping Homunculus in mid July. If you’re afraid you won’t get enough and you live near the brewery, then you might consider joining our Big Beer Series Subscription.