Beat The Hop Shortage With No-chill.

[Thirsty Boy]

I've been thinking -

A while ago I ran a test on my new hop/trub filter. I wanted to see if it would clog up under brew conditions, but I didn't want to waste a whole brewday's worth of effort to find out. So what I did was heat up 25L of water to about 95, stir in a couple of hundred grams of old POR hop pellets I had lying around, let it sit for a few minutes so the hops would re-hydrate, then drain it out through the filter.

The test was a success and my filter handled the load as well as I wanted. All good.

But I also wanted to make sure that I would not be transferring any "plastic" flavours to my brew by running it through the plastic filter housing. So I saved 500ml of the filtered liquid for tasting once it had cooled. It was (thankfully) lacking in plastic flavours, very very hoppy and (finally getting to the topic) very very bitter.

This surprised me a little, I was expecting bitter, but not the intensity I encountered. Remember, these hops had never been boiled, only steeped in 95C water, and not for very long at that. 10mins max of soaking before I started to run it through the filter, and it was all through in maybe 15-30minutes.... So these pellets had a maximum of 40mins contact with hot water and no boiling... yet I patently got a significant amount of utilisation of the alpha acids.

It didn't strike me as much until the last couple of days, when I was contemplating the hop shortage and how you could try and save hops. So here's my idea (of course someone has probably already talked about it, so I apologise in advance if this is the case)

Assumptions - really they are. I'm speculating about what might be the case if they are true.

• If you put hops into a no-chill cube and seal it up - all the aroma compounds and all the flavour compounds that normally get "boiled" off, are trapped and must therefore still be in the wort after it has cooled.
• Given my experience described above. Hops put directly into the cube will steep in very hot wort till it cools - and this will result in significant isomerisation of the alpha acids. I'm going to have a stab in the dark and say that the utilisation is equivalent to that which you would get from a 30min boil

Conclusions

• By adding ALL your hops to the NC cube and NONE to the kettle - you could effectively combine the aroma, flavour and bittering kettle additions into one smaller addition in the cube

An Example - with numbers to make it real

Take a 20L batch of APA - roughly 1.050with a 4.5kg gran bill. We want it pretty bitter and with intense hop flavours and aromas

so a normal hop schedule would be (using cascade pellets at 6%AA)

25g @90min
40g @10min
40g @Flame Out

for a total of 34.4IBU using 105g of hops in total.

Using the NC hopping schedule we would need to get the equivalent IBUs from a 30min addition

so 34.4IBUs in that wort would need 70g@30min - thats only 70g in total

Remember we have assumed that cube hopping retains all the flavour and aroma compounds - so, this means that with 70g of hops we are achieving the bitterness we want and we are actually getting the equivalent of a 70g flavour addition & a 70g aroma addition.

So - just as much bitterness, more flavour and more aroma - all with only 2/3rds of the hops

Sounds bloody good to me!!

I wonder how true it might be??

Thirsty

 

[mje1980]

Interesting idea mate. Let us know how it goes.

 

[Ross]

Will be an interesting experiment TB,

Personally i think you'll find it way under bittered once you use sweet wort rather than water. I do plenty of beers with fairly large late/flame out additions, which are then steeped for 30 mins & then cooled for another 30mins & they do not appear to gain any appreciable bitterness. Also, from peoples reports I've read on this forum, when they've poured hot wort onto hop additions in the cube, they've been dissapointed with the aroma profile.

Will be keen to hear how you go though; & nothing that can't be fixed with a bit of Isohop if necessary.

cheers Ross

 

[troydo]

I no chill all my brews, one brew turned out extremely bitter, and the only thing i can think of is that it was the first time i used flowers and ALOT of them ended up in the cube... so i think your plan has legs....

 

[Cortez The Killer]

I often put about 20g odd of hops into the cube instead of late additions - I can't say that I've really noticed any heightened bitterness

Cheers

 

[SpillsMostOfIt]

Someone once advised me to add some hops to the NCCube to enhance aroma, which I did. One Trust Point deducted from their score - it just made it more bitter.

When we did our Big Brew with the Pebble Bed Mash Tun, we First Wort Hopped by adding the hops to the kettle before we commenced the sparging operation. The liquor was quite bitter before we even lit the kettles, adding credence to the concept.

If only there was a way to test this idea... :huh:

 

[~MikE]

i think you'd have a better chance using a pressure cooker to save the flavour and aroma from bittering hops.

 

[Sammus]

I think boiling the bittering hops is fairly important, as you drive of certain undesirable compounds in the boil. Maybe you can add a little bitterness by adding a plug or two to the cube, but I think if all your bitterness was done that way you'd have a pretty mediocre result.

That said, I'm not expert and am still curious to see how it goes...

 

[kevnlis]

If you add the hops to the cube, once it has been filled with wort, then cap it ASAP, how will you lose the oils? They have no way to evaporate.

I have always wondered at what temperature hops stop isomerising. Never found it in any of my readings. Anyone know?

 

[warrenlw63]

I've added them to the NC cube on several occasions. To be honest I've been underwhelmed in terms of aroma. My highly un-educated guess would be that the effect is more in keeping with a regular flavour hop (say 15 mins from flameout) addition rather than a proper aroma addition you would normally have encountered had you have chilled the wort etc.

From here on if I were looking for better hop aroma rather than wasting twice the amount in the cube I'd rather use half the amount as a dry hop when primary fermentation has subsided.

To me it's still the number one drawback of NC brewing. <_< Capturing that great hop aroma that a flameout addition affords you when chilling the wort via normal practices.

Warren -

 

[kram]

If you add the hops to the cube, once it has been filled with wort, then cap it ASAP, how will you lose the oils? They have no way to evaporate.

I have always wondered at what temperature hops stop isomerising. Never found it in any of my readings. Anyone know?

I'll try and find the link when I get home, but I recall reading it was 70.

 

[Adamt]

The thing I am concerned with for this logic is the assumption which you rightly highlighted, especially considering this "stab in the dark" is the base for the argument. How long does it take for a no-chill cube to cool? I've got some data on isomerisation kinetics which may be able to at least shed light on the IBU issue.

 

[Adamt]

I'll try and find the link when I get home, but I recall reading it was 70.

There is no real lower limit, it's just a lot slower at lower temperatures.

 

[mfdes]

When we talk about hop oils evaporating, that is not the only thing that happens to them explaining why we lose the aroma. Hop aromatic oils are being chemically changed the moment they hit the hot wort. These chemical changes alter the flavour and aroma, explaining in part why wet hopped beers taste so different to dry hopped ones, and why hops in contact with hot wort for longer have more flavour and less aroma. The aroma compounds are also largely responsible for what we call flavour. They are just different chemicals that are being converted over boil / soak time.
Do remember that strictly speaking beer only has 4 flavours, like everything else: sweet, sour, salty and bitter. Everything else is aroma.

MFS.

 

[lagers44]

Hi Thirsty

I came across this article ages ago which sheds some light on the subject , but also unfortunately pokes some holes in your theory but then it does go on about late hopping not necessarily for cubes.

http://www.mrmalty.com/late_hopping.htm


Lagers

 

[Thirsty Boy]

The thing I am concerned with for this logic is the assumption which you rightly highlighted, especially considering this "stab in the dark" is the base for the argument. How long does it take for a no-chill cube to cool? I've got some data on isomerisation kinetics which may be able to at least shed light on the IBU issue.

Yeah - it genuinely was a stab i the dark. But I am confident that there would be "considerble" isomerisation. Those cubes stay hot for a long time and as you said, there isn't really a lower limit, its just a speed thing. I was listening to a pro-brewer talk the other week (either the BNB or BBR) and he was absolutely convinced that there was perceptable bitterness added to his brews even from dry hop additions and certainly from late hop additions.

Actually, from the article that Lagers44 just linked to Matt Brynildson (Firestone Walker) Talks about whirlpool hopping, which is about as close to cube hopping as you are going to find in more traditional brewing - "Brynildson goes on to say, American Craft Brewers practice a number of different methods of late hopping, with one very popular method being whirlpool hopping. This is a bit of a fusion between traditional late hopping and hopback methods. Adding hops late in the whirlpool results in lower isomerization of alpha acids and good uptake of hop oils and flavor components (especially with pellet hops). The fact that there is some isomerization (about 15% in whirlpool versus 35% in the kettle) of alpha acid means that not only hop aroma and hop flavor can be achieved, but also some bittering. - So if you look at a whirpool addition as being able to achieve only slightly less than half the isomerisation of a kettle addition (ie the 15% vs 35% figures from the quote) then a guess at a 30min addition doesn't look too bad. After all, most whirlpool rests only last for 10minutes plus whatever time the transfer takes. So if you can get almost half as much isomerisation out 30mins in the whirpool as you get out of a "bittering" addition, then I think the much longer contact time you have in an NC cube would have to get somewhere near the 30min addition mark...... admittedly still speculation though.

Maybe one reason why people don't get an increase in bitterness from Cube hopping is that people most frequently "cube hop" with a low alpha hop?? and there just isn't that much alpha acid to convert? probably not though.

Lagers44 - which bits of that article poke holes in the theory? I actually found it reasonably supportive of the idea. Not that I care if it gets holes poked in it, I'm just thinking in public on this topic, happy to be wrong. I just got the opposite out of that article is all.

Mfdes - your point is the one that is where the whole thing falls down a little. As Warrenlw63 and others have also pointed out, there doesn't seem to be that great a preservation of flavour and aroma from late (or cube) additions in NC beers (Although Warren did miss the point a little with "rather than waste twice as much in the cube" Remember, the object of this post is to save hops by combining the bittering/flavour/aroma additions into one and simply to avoid the "boiling off" effect that means you lose stuff from earlier additions. The idea is to force the hops to do double and maybe triple duty. Thusly while you might have to put in twice as many "aroma" hops for the same effect... they are also your flavour hops AND your bittering hops, so you have a Net saving.)

Mfdes - Your post more or less tells us why the Cube additions aren't so effective. Although I'm not convinced you are 100% right. There certainly are volatile aroma compounds that do evaporate away - every bit of hoppy goodness you smell when you dump your hops in the kettle is hoppy goodness that isn't making it into your beer. Trapping those compounds has to do something. But of course you are mostly right about the conversion of compounds leading to the difference between "flavour" and "aroma" additions.

I just wonder what the effect of putting ALL the hops in the cube would be? I'm certain that with a little number juggling, the bitterness thing is a technicality that could be compensated for - perhaps the sheer volume of hops into the cube in a "cube hopping only" beer would go some way to compensating for the changes in the aroma and flavour compounds. Its not going to be the "same" as a late hop addition, but maybe its a method that can be adapted to give the same sort of results.

One of the interesting things I have seen come out of the response to my idea so far, is that any flavour and especially aroma additions you might put into a No-Chilled beer, are effectively useless. If putting them directly in the cube is pointless - then putting them in the wort and then transferring that to a cube is no different. So you might as well leave them in the fridge and save some dollars?? If nothing else thats a concept thats worth thinking about.

Anyway - like I said, I'm just thinking in public. Not really all that fussed one way or another. I'm more or less over hoppy beers and I get the large proportion of my hops for free. So the hop shortage is something that happens to other people. One of these days I might conduct a split boil experiment and compare say a wort with 35IBUs worth of 60min addition to a beer with my guess at 35IBUs worth of NC cube addition.Just to see what the difference in bitterness flavour and aroma are.

Till then I leave it int he hands of those of you who are into the hoppy beers and have to pay for the hops to make them happen. Just tryin' to give you some options to play with.

Thirsty

 

[lagers44]

Lagers44 - which bits of that article poke holes in the theory? I actually found it reasonably supportive of the idea. Not that I care if it gets holes poked in it, I'm just thinking in public on this topic, happy to be wrong. I just got the opposite out of that article is all.

Thirsty

Hi Thirsty

The hole poking refers to the idea that you can use less hops at the end of the boil to impart flavour/aroma & bitterness for cubes. In fact it states that you need lots more hops to achieve this at the end of the process , so it's no way to beat the hop shortage.

Maybe i've read or misinterprated both articles , but thats the imformation I gleened.

Lagers

 

[Dave86]

One way to beat the hop shortage is to buy some standard plugs from Neville at gryphon brewing. $26 for half a kilo! Just got some EKG, saaz and cascade from neville here so I should be right for most styles for a while Just got to wait for some others to turn up from Ross and I should be right!

Yes, I am affliated, they sponsor this site!

 

[Kai]

I've been adding hops to cubes of hot wort ever since I first forgot to put a flavour addition into the kettle a couple years ago. I get good hop flavour from it and calculate the bittering as a 5-10 minute addition depending on which way the wind is blowing that day.

 

[Thirsty Boy]

Hi Thirsty

The hole poking refers to the idea that you can use less hops at the end of the boil to impart flavour/aroma & bitterness for cubes. In fact it states that you need lots more hops to achieve this at the end of the process , so it's no way to beat the hop shortage.

Maybe i've read or misinterprated both articles , but thats the imformation I gleened.

Lagers

Sorry mate but you have misinterpreted what I'm saying at least, although it sounds like you have got what JP is saying - probably a comment on our relative skills as communicators.

The problem can be solved by referring to the example I gave - It clearly shows that you would go from using 105g of hops to using only 70g of hops - so definitely less.

Now my example relies on my highlighted assumptions being true - which they might not be. So the actuality of the situation could be way different.

Like I said, I got from the article a quite nice confirmation of the underlying thrust of my theory, which is that there is significant bittering gained from late additions - roughly 15% AA utilisation from whirlpool addition vs 35% from a "bittering" addition... so almost half as much. I am assuming (again) that you would do even better from a cube addition because there is a lot longer contact time with hot wort than there would be for a whirpool addition.

Shoving that 15% vs 35% utilisation figure into pro-mash (Rager formula) it looks like Matt Brynildson is calculating his whirlpool addition to give the same bittering as (roughly) a 25min addition.

I worked this out thusly

20L of 1.050 wort with 20g of 10%AA POR @ 60min = 30IBU

Now taking Brynildson's 15%vs35% figures, you are getting 43% (15/35x100) of the bittering from a whirlpool that you would get from a 60min addition, so 43% of 30 IBU is 12.9 IBU - keeping the weight and alpha % constant in pro-mash and changing the boil time - I get a figure of 12.1 IBU at 25mins, so near enough.

Which comes pretty close to supporting my original "stab in the dark" guestimate of cube hops being equivalent to a 30min addition... I think the extra utilisation from the extended contact with hot wort might make up the difference. And that would make my 33%ish savings in hops a reasonable ballpark figure.

Either that or it me who is misinterpreting the JP article as well as what you are saying - and thats probably more likely

Kai - Cool, someone who does it regularly. Mate you are a man with brewing knowledge out the proverbial. You count the cube addition as equal to a 5-10min boil addition - what do you think the differences between an addition to a kettle and an addition to hot but not boiling wort in a cube are? My guesses would be temperature and agitation. The cube is going to be hot - but less than 100C - even if not a lot less over a period of an hour or so. But I think the main difference is probably the agitation. Hops in a kettle are getting swished about the place fairly vigorously; and in the cube they are just sitting on the bottom. Kind of like comparing jiggling or dangling a teabag. (this is also a difference between a cube and a whirlpool addition) If the object of the game was to increase the utilisation of the hops in the cube - do you think that shaking the cube up every now and again while it was still nice and hot, might increase the bitterness extracted? And if so, do you think it could get up to the levels of a 25-30min addition?? That seems to be the point at which you would actually be able to use cube hopping as a "hop saving" method.

I'd be really interested in what you think

Thirsty