Hop
Melba
An Australian hop named for the peach dessert, with a matching stone-fruit profile.
Melba is stone-fruit forward — peach and apricot with a mango edge — and sits between Galaxy's passionfruit intensity and the softer profile of the older Australian varieties.
Useful where a beer wants Australian fruit character without Galaxy's dominance.
Aroma and flavour
Descriptors are impressions rather than analytical results. BeerHQ rates this characterisation as commonly reported.
Belongs to
Analysis
| Alpha acid | 12–16% |
|---|---|
| Purpose | aroma |
| Origin | Australia |
| Storage stability | unknown |
How it is used
- Late boil. Added in the last few minutes, retaining more aromatic oils while adding modest bitterness.
- Whirlpool / hop stand. Steeped below boiling after flameout. Extracts aroma and flavour with limited additional bitterness.
- Dry hop. Added after the boil, during or after fermentation. Contributes aroma and flavour with essentially no isomerised bitterness.
If you like Melba
Hops with comparable character. Similarity and substitutability are different questions, so each entry says which it is: a hop can smell alike and still change the beer if its alpha acid is far off.
Galaxy 12–16% alpha
Shares stone fruit, tropical fruit, citrus with Melba; an aroma variety at a comparable alpha acid.
Not the same: nothing in the recorded profile separates the two, which means BeerHQ cannot tell you how they differ rather than that they are interchangeable.
Close enough in both aroma and alpha acid to swap in a recipe.
El Dorado 13–16% alpha
Shares stone fruit, tropical fruit, citrus with Melba; a dual-purpose variety at a comparable alpha acid.
Not the same: nothing in the recorded profile separates the two, which means BeerHQ cannot tell you how they differ rather than that they are interchangeable.
Close enough in both aroma and alpha acid to swap in a recipe.
Styrian Wolf 10–15% alpha
Shares stone fruit, tropical fruit, citrus with Melba; an aroma variety at a comparable alpha acid.
Not the same: nothing in the recorded profile separates the two, which means BeerHQ cannot tell you how they differ rather than that they are interchangeable.
Close enough in both aroma and alpha acid to swap in a recipe.
Eclipse 14–18% alpha
Shares stone fruit, tropical fruit, citrus with Melba; an aroma variety though it bitters harder.
Not the same: nothing in the recorded profile separates the two, which means BeerHQ cannot tell you how they differ rather than that they are interchangeable.
Smells alike, but the alpha acid differs enough that a like-for-like swap would change the bitterness.
Citra 11–13% alpha
Shares stone fruit, tropical fruit, citrus with Melba; an aroma variety though it bitters more gently.
Not the same: nothing in the recorded profile separates the two, which means BeerHQ cannot tell you how they differ rather than that they are interchangeable.
Smells alike, but the alpha acid differs enough that a like-for-like swap would change the bitterness.
Straight substitutes
Close enough in both character and alpha acid to swap at a similar weight. Substitution is directional and imperfect — these are the nearest available options, not equivalents.
- Galaxy — Shares stone fruit, tropical fruit, citrus with Melba; an aroma variety at a comparable alpha acid.
- El Dorado — Shares stone fruit, tropical fruit, citrus with Melba; a dual-purpose variety at a comparable alpha acid.
- Styrian Wolf — Shares stone fruit, tropical fruit, citrus with Melba; an aroma variety at a comparable alpha acid.
- Sabro — Shares tropical fruit, citrus with Melba; an aroma variety at a comparable alpha acid.