Hops ‘Nugget’ (Humulus lupulus), an all-purpose bittering American variety, adapted to our humid summers. Popular and sought after for brewing IPAs and other imperial beers, offers complex notes, mainly resinous and herbaceous, with a little lemon-ginger spiciness. The endless vines dress fences, shade pergolas or camouflage a decrepit building or an electric pole in a rural landscape. Although its herbaceous stems freeze each winter, providing abundant material for basketry, they take off again when the mild weather returns and can reach the top of a 12-meter tree with incredible speed. In hop gardens, we optimize the culture with 4 or 5 meter poles. It is wrapped with miniature hooks around a support planted in any soil that drains well.

Towards the end of summer, when a scent catches your nostrils as you pass by, it’s time to harvest the resinous female flowers with scales hiding a golden dust whose tannins help preserve food, traditionally beer, and whose fruity, lemony and floral bitterness blends with pastry sweets, which are then enriched with essential fatty acids, rare in the plant kingdom. The shoots that emerge along elusive rhizomes represent a nice problem for gourmands who swap the fork for the fork, since in truth, the chore takes a happy turn when the invader ends up on the plate, in cooked and tender or raw and crunchy micro-asparagus, available mainly in spring. Their soporific effect, effective in bitter herbal tea that is both digestive, promotes deep sleep on a pillow filled with hops ‘Nugget’.

Some gardeners have skin that reacts badly to contact with its rough stems, which can be very irritating. Be careful with your arms and legs when pruning and harvesting, but also be careful with your eyes and the entire face. Gloves and long clothing may be necessary. It attempts to invade any terrain, except in acidic or overly shaded soils, seeking cool, humid conditions, and is drought tolerant.