Verdant spent six months getting this right. The Falmouth brewery wanted a low-alcohol IPA that their own staff would actually choose to drink, and the development involved enough test batches and internal tastings to produce something they were willing to put their name on. The approach is notably different from many AF beers: rather than brewing to strength and stripping the alcohol out, they use a specific yeast strain alongside conventional technique to keep the ABV at 0.5% from the start. That means the hop character doesn't have to survive a dealcoholisation process. Five hops go in: Chinook for resinous pine and light citrus, Citra and El Dorado for tropical brightness, Simcoe for earthy pine and passion fruit, and Mosaic for tropical and blueberry character. The malt base is built on Golden Promise and Light Munich with Flaked Wheat for a degree of haze softness, and a touch of Caramalt for body. The pour is clear and pale gold rather than murky. The result is a beer that sits convincingly in the IPA category: genuinely hoppy, not sweet or watery, with a dry finish that reads like a proper ale. For a brewery with Verdant's reputation in hop-forward beers, the transition to 0.5% feels like a genuine commitment rather than a box-ticking exercise.