Dry Hopping

[skippy]

Always was sceptical about dry hopping...Just dry hopped a "Beermakers" Lager kit (cheapest lager kit available.. made using 1.25 kg Dextrose, 23L H2O, 1/3 cup Saaz pellets (all boiled 45 min), 2 packets S-23, ferm @ 11C for 2 weeks, then filtered.)

Dry hopped with 1/2 cup Saaz, week later, PERFECT ...thanks to the 'Tea-balls' from Ross.

Anyone else with pleasent dry hopping experiances?

 

[wimbymoonshine]

hiya,

Firstly, you said that you boiled your kit for 45 mins... is this kit hopped or unhopped?
i semi-dry hopped a pale. Boiled a combo of DME and glucose and in the last 1min added the hops in a muslin bag to release some of the hop oils and sterilise the bag. Then threw all this in the fermenter for the entire fermenting process plus a few extra days to let the hop infuse the wort as ive been told that during the primary ferment the gas given off can carry the hop oils off. so all in all the hops was in the wort for 11 days. Then bottled and cracked one yesterday. FANTASTIC.. can really smell the hop aroma and it lingers on the back of the nose when ur drinking it.. LOVE IT!

cheers from the UK

 

[mfdes]

Hey guys,

Dry hopping is adding the hops into the cold wort or beer. Usually after fermentation but not always. Chucking hops in hot wort or water is not dry hopping and the flavour you get is totally different. A lot of aromatic hop oils will evaporate the minute the hops hit hot liquid and the only way you can get them into beer is by putting the hops in towards the end of or after fermentation.

Also the tricks with dry hopping are: don't worry, and go easy on the hops. Start with small amounts (10-14 gm) and let them steep for a week or two tasting every couple of days). Nothing worse than overdoing the dry hops to make a beer sickly aromatic and not enjoyable, especially if the FG was a bit high.

Finally remember you won't get a great beer from a bad beer by dry hopping. Start off with a good beer base and go easy on the hops.

MFS.

 

[beerguide]

I have had an IPA down for about 5 days now. Last night the airlock began showing signs of (or approaching) the end of the primary fermentation as it was bubbling quite reguarly, and then last night barely a noise.

I've just been reading up on Dry Hopping and from all my gravity readings so far there has been a reasonable hop flavour, but very little on the nose. For this reason I'd like to add around 8-10 grams of hops as a dry hop. Reading the threads on dry hopping (eg: like this one) I get the impression now is close to an ideal time to dry hop? Is this right?

mfdes - you say to leave it then steeping for a week or two, does this apply to ales also? Everything I've read suggests to bottle/keg as soon as possible when the primary is finished, but your suggesting the opposite. Should I rack the Ale to a new fermenter to dry hop, or will just dropping it in the current one be fine.

 

[Steve]

I have had an IPA down for about 5 days now. Last night the airlock began showing signs of (or approaching) the end of the primary fermentation as it was bubbling quite reguarly, and then last night barely a noise.

I've just been reading up on Dry Hopping and from all my gravity readings so far there has been a reasonable hop flavour, but very little on the nose. For this reason I'd like to add around 8-10 grams of hops as a dry hop. Reading the threads on dry hopping (eg: like this one) I get the impression now is close to an ideal time to dry hop? Is this right?

mfdes - you say to leave it then steeping for a week or two, does this apply to ales also? Everything I've read suggests to bottle/keg as soon as possible when the primary is finished, but your suggesting the opposite. Should I rack the Ale to a new fermenter to dry hop, or will just dropping it in the current one be fine.

Zoddy - chuck a small handfull into a new fermenter and rack on top of it. Leave for 3-4 days then bottle. :beer:

 

[Ross]

I have had an IPA down for about 5 days now. Last night the airlock began showing signs of (or approaching) the end of the primary fermentation as it was bubbling quite reguarly, and then last night barely a noise.

I've just been reading up on Dry Hopping and from all my gravity readings so far there has been a reasonable hop flavour, but very little on the nose. For this reason I'd like to add around 8-10 grams of hops as a dry hop. Reading the threads on dry hopping (eg: like this one) I get the impression now is close to an ideal time to dry hop? Is this right?

mfdes - you say to leave it then steeping for a week or two, does this apply to ales also? Everything I've read suggests to bottle/keg as soon as possible when the primary is finished, but your suggesting the opposite. Should I rack the Ale to a new fermenter to dry hop, or will just dropping it in the current one be fine.

Dry hop now is perfect. Leave on hops for minimum 3 days, ideally 1 week. I'd be upping to 1gm/L of hops as well, which is a good starting level. eg 23gms.

Edit: dry hopping in primary is fine, it's what I do.


cheers Ross

 

[beerguide]

So the additional time (3-7 days) after fermentation has finished is fine?

Ross, thanks for the suggestion of 1gm/ltr I'll have a run with that - high hop beers are fine by me

 

[mfdes]

About dry hopping ales being appropriate too: I in act think dry hopping lagers pretty much kills the subtleties of a lager and is in fact inappropriate, and should only be done regularly with ales. English ales are the originally dry hopped styles.
That said, you might find a dry hopped lager is perfectly to your liking and I'm not trying to say that you will like or dislike things the way I do.

Regarding waiting times: if you listen to what many award winning brewers do, they don't hurry to get the beer of the yeast unless it's a very delicate style. Even with lagers at cold temperatures there is really no hurry to move the beer from the yeast sediment. You will eventually want to, but the time scales are a bit more lenient than most people believe.
If you have some measure of temperature control it can be good to lower it a bit for dry hopping but not much. For example I just fermented a summer ale with a Kolsch yeast. I brewed on a Saturday, and put the wort into a plastic fermenter overnight to chill to 14 degrees. I pitched the yeast on the Sunday morning at 14 degrees, and allowed the temperature to gently rise to 16. After the beer had fermented for 3 or 4 days and the majority of the activity was finished I bumped the temperature up gradually to 19 degrees and held it there till the beer was mostly clear.
The extra 2 or 3 days warm allows the yeast to do two things: get the finishing gravity down low enough (I want this beer to be DRY) and reabsorb its fermentation by-products (diacetyl, acetaldehyde, some other bad flavour compounds). Tomorrow I'll be lowering the temperature again to 12 degrees by putting the fermenter in my cellar, and at this stage I'll taste the beer to see if I need to dry hop it. I'll leave it in the cellar to drop clear of yeast till the weekend (4-5 days).
I have something else in my secondary fermenter and listening to some of the brewing podcasts (Jamil's and Basic Brewing Radio) you'll hear recommended to let the yeast have enough time to finish the job if you want the best beer.

Hope this helps.
MFS.

 

[Kingy]

I brewed this double batch yesterday and was thinking of splitting it and trying out this dry hopping stuff :lol:
I plan on fermenting half just normal for 14 days and the other half rack to secondary after 7 days and dry hop for 7 days.
Then after the total ferment of 14 days,keg them both at the same time so i can taste the difference.

So im after any suggestions as to what hops to use and how much.

Im thinking maybe about 15 grams of amirillo.

cheers,kingy




Amount Item Type % or IBU
9.50 kg Pilsner (2 Row) Ger (3.9 EBC) Grain 93.14 %
0.30 kg Crystal (Joe White) (141.8 EBC) Grain 2.94 %
0.25 kg Melanoiden Malt (39.4 EBC) Grain 2.45 %
0.15 kg Chocolate Malt (Joe White) (750.6 EBC) Grain 1.47 %

30.00 gm Northern Brewer [6.50 %] (60 min) Hops 11.3 IBU
30.00 gm Northern Brewer [6.50 %] (45 min) Hops 10.4 IBU
35.00 gm Cascade [6.70 %] (15 min) Hops 6.8 IBU
25.00 gm Amarillo Gold [8.90 %] (15 min) Hops 6.4 IBU
35.00 gm Cascade [6.70 %] (5 min) Hops 2.7 IBU
25.00 gm Amarillo Gold [8.90 %] (5 min) Hops 2.6 IBU

and using us56

edit: upon reading a few other websites i think ill stick with dry hopping with 20 grams of cascade for 7 days.