NJ-grown hops are the newest local beer trend

Those who follow the latest tastes and tendencies in craft beer, both in consuming and brewing it, might hope their local brewery can get its hands on, for instance, the hops used to make a "juicy" India pale ale.

In many cases, that's far easier said than done, according to Mike Kivowitz, founder and president of the New Jersey Craft Beer website, and advocate for the state's approximately 130 beermakers.

"Those (hops) are proprietary, and you can't even buy the rhizomes, to grow them and cultivate them, from the manufacturers," Kivowitz said.

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One solution seems simple: breweries growing their own hops, as is now being done at Readington Brewery & Hop Farm in Hunterdon County, which just opened late last year.

And that might work well for a location that has the space to do it like Readington, or Screamin' Hill in Cream Ridge, but not every brewery is laid out in a conducive configuration, Kivowitz said.

"Someone like Kane or Carton," he said, "or Flying Fish, they don't have a ridiculous amount of farmland on site."

The other major complication is that hop growing just is a time-consuming process, according to Kivowitz.

A brewer has to obtain lumber, situate it on their property, order the rhizomes, cultivate them — and then do a little bit of pest control, getting praying mantises to eat the "bad bugs" that gather.

"We are the Garden State, sure, but it takes maybe 10 years to get a good amount of hops growing that are going to come back year to year," Kivowitz said, adding that even when the hops do grow, they still take a while to make it into a batch of beer. "A lot of the hops that they're growing are fresh hops, they're whole-leaf hops. They're not being pelletized and crushed down into dehydrated, dried-out hops."

Kivowitz thinks that "Jersey Fresh" hops could increase over time, and could prove to be a financially sound decision for some breweries, but that patience is a virtue.

For any New Jerseyans who are especially curious about where their beer comes from, Kivowitz also mentioned Rabbit Hill Malt in Shiloh, which he said many Garden State breweries use exclusively for their malt supply.

Patrick Lavery is New Jersey 101.5's afternoon news anchor. Follow him on Twitter @plavery1015 or email patrick.lavery@townsquaremedia.com.

The Ultimate Guide to New Jersey Brewpubs

From the website that gave you the "Friendliest bars" and places to watch the game, comes the ultimate guide to New Jersey brewpubs.

So what's a "brew pub"?

According to Thompson Island's Article on the differences between a craft brewery, microbrewery, brewpub & gastropub, it says:

"A brewpub is a hybrid between a restaurant and a brewery. It sells at least 25% of its beer on-site in combination with significant food services. At a brewpub, the beer is primarily brewed for sale inside the restaurant or bar. Where it's legally allowed, brewpubs may sell beer to go or distribute it to some offsite destinations."

New Jersey has tons of Brewpubs, some of which have been around for years and some that have just opened in the past year.

Here is a full list of the 21 brewpubs in New Jersey according to New Jersey Craft Beer:

Where everyone knows your name: Friendliest bars in NJ

Every NJ pizza joint Barstool's Dave Portnoy has reviewed

Dave Portnoy, commonly known as El Presidente, is the founder of Barstool Sports. Somewhere along the way, he decided to start reviewing local pizzerias, and the concept took off. Here is every New Jersey pizzeria Dave has stopped in, along with the score he gave them.