From my second favourite New Zealand brewery comes 8 Wired – Fresh Hopwired Wet Hopped IPA (7.3%, poured from a 16.9 oz bottle at home).
Aroma and Appearance: Pours a hazy light amber with a butt load of foam and has a mild floral and tangerine hop aroma which is a bit hard to detect over the foam.
Flavour: It has a spicy bready malt tone at first and then mellows into a fruity and bready balanced beer that has a grapefruit finish
Overall Impression: This is a good beer, but I drank it 2 months after the best before date on the bottom (oops) and it was noticeable, this is something you want to drink fresh so I am a bit mad at myself right now.
Rating: I would rate about 8/10 based on a fresher sample I had a while back that I thought was awesome. This bottle was lower, but its not fair to rate them on an expired bottle and fresh hopped beers are meant to be consumed immediately so since the fresher sample was very memorable and tasty I am confident a newer bottle would be too. Just be sure to check the bottom of the bottle first.
Food Pairing: Spicy nachos would be nice with this
West Coast Beer Geek 
I’d be intrigued as to what your favourite NZ brewer might be? I was drinking this tonight and whilst the freshness of the hops was the thing I found it nicely balanced and, well, quaffable.
From New Zealand, I would go with MOA as my #1 craft beer maker. Some amazing stuff, their Imperial Stout that is Barrel Aged in Pinot Noir bottles is outstanding for example. Sadly this bottle of 8 wired was expired, I base my rating on a fresher sample. However, fresh hopped beers don’t travel well either so as an import there is only so far it will go.
Some of the Moa beers are indeed very nice, and they package them well. Some though, like most craft beer output from all brewers, is a bit hit and miss.
Nice to see that we’re getting our beers drunk over there and we usually only say that about one of our more average beers Steinlager.
Some pretty good stuff coming out of that country now into ours; 8 Wired, MOA and Renaissance have all had some good ones and I am sure there is more to come.
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