httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8pEDe6wP0k&list=UUX0V7_KS7EakUIhoWWR7k0Q

Our 2013 effort to source local hops for our annual harvest ale, Secret Stash, set the groundwork for this year's 2014 Northeast Hop Selection - connecting local hop growers with local breweries.

Area hop growers, represented by the Maryland Chapter of the Northeast Hop Growers Alliance, brought samples of this year’s lot (including Crystal, Cascade, Chinook and Brewers Gold) for 15 Maryland breweries to evaluate and bid on.

Allow our brewmaster Matt Brophy to explain: "We have an obligation to the growers and to our fellow brewers. A lot of them are a lot smaller than us, so it's a great chance for us to host this event and have brewers come out and look through the hops -- touch them, smell them -- and buy some of them to use, whether that's in a firkin, a 10-barrel batch, a 50-barrel batch, or in our case, a 200-barrel batch."

700 pounds of Maryland hops were contracted and will inevitably find their way back into Maryland pint glasses. This is what #SupportLocal is all about.