Belt’s Beer Garden: I’m Hip...I’m With It

Tucson, Arizona is home to the state’s oldest brewery - Barrio Brewing Company - which has been around since 1991. In 2020 the brewery became 100% employee owned, the first of its kind in Arizona. Today you can find their brews across the state but they have yet to start distributing elsewhere.

I found a single 12-ounce can of their hazy IPA, Hipsterville, for the very reasonable price of $2.29 so, naturally, I had to grab it. The hop varieties aren’t listed but it was made with flaked wheat and oats and has a 6.4% ABV.

Hipsterville was quite cloudy and was a golden copper color with just over a finger of head topping it off. The eggshell white, slightly tannish, foam slowly faded down but left little lacing as it did so.

The nose was tropical with notes of tangerine, papaya, pineapple, and some bitter grapefruit. Behind the fruit were some flaked wheat and oat aromas that added a light cereal quality to the smell and balanced out the brew.

My first sip started with a burst of carbonation that fizzled across the tongue. The tropical fruit flavors quickly appeared out of the effervescence and, leading the way, was a quick pop of juicy tangerine/orange and lemon.

The lemon added a mild tartness to the beer that was amplified when the pineapple showed up a few moments later with some added acidity. However, midway through, there was a massive burst of juicy mango and papaya that overpowered the initial flavors. Those fruity flavors lasted for the remainder of the sip, with some minor additions popping up here and there.

One of those minor changes was the addition of a grapefruit late in the game that added a small pithy flavor and brought a dash of dry bitterness to the brew. However, the dryness wouldn’t last long and, quickly, faded out.

Hipsterville started off with a thinner, more watery body to it but, when that mango/papaya combination hit, the brew turned more creamy and finished a bit thicker than I was initially thinking it would be.

It finished quite cleanly, with just a hint of that citrus peel dryness lingering on. The easy finish made it a very crushable brew because I was ready for my next sip almost immediately.

All in all, it was a very solid hazy IPA and well worth the ~$2 I paid for the can. If I was in Arizona much longer I could see this easily becoming a nice, everyday sipper. A well made beer from the oldest brewery in the state.