Green Hops

[kieran]

Hey all,

So, I harvested my bines.. and have about 180g of fresh cascade flowers. I haven't dried them, they are vac-sealed and frozen.

Can anyone tell me the benefits/differences of using fresh/green hops vs dried hops? I see a lot of "Fresh Hopped" ales etc. but that doesn't help me get a feel for what differences there are between a fresh and dried flower. Is it more pungent? More grassy? More bitter? etc.
I wanted it fresh because I thought it might retain more aroma, but I didn't really have any evidence for that at all.

Regardless, they'll probably be rather dodgy, my plants were rather neglected this year.. and nibbled on/pissed on/shat on by rats too, early in the season.. (the roots/rhizomes of my willamettes became quite a tasty snack for the little fuckers - until I poisoned them with Talon).

cheers,
Kieran

 

[Steve@PMF82]

I would hazard a guess that if you use them after freezing all you will taste is grass.
The freezing will contribute significantly to the degradation (rupture of cells) of the green plant matter which you dont want in your wort.

Ever frozen some fresh herbs like basil? On thawing if you touch it you will have green hands, but it doesn't matter too much if your just using it for pesto.

 

[QldKev]

I've used them frozen from fresh, I love them.

Think of it as fresh herbs Vs dried herbs, fresh are just so much better.

I would throw them in a beer you have made several times before, then you will pick the difference. Remember that the hops wet weight is a lot more than their dry weight.

QldKev

 

[manticle]

I have used frozen from fresh, fresh straight off the bine (too few in each case to bother drying) and dried (commercial).

Fresh straight off the bine is currently being cold conditioned and was only dry hopped 3 days ago so I'll report back on that one. No amazingly unwelcome flavours from tasting before CC.

Frozen from fresh was fine for dry hopping but I am always conservative with my dry hopping amounts and times. I don't over dry hop (usually stick to 1g/L for dry pellets, amounts of wet/frozen wouldn't exceeed that, and usually only for about 3-5 days max). Type of hop may also influence things as well.

 

[Lecterfan]

I had some fresh picked, vac sealed and frozen last season, kept them for about 9 or 10 months, gave them to a mate to use. I was there when he opened them and they were bloody horrible. Having said that, mine were picked way too early last season - if others have had success with sealing/freezing fresh hops I suspect it means the hops were nice and papery and significantly more 'ripe-for-picking' than mine were due to my first year eagerness.

I didn't make that mistake this year haha.

edit: moral of my post was that by picking early they were still very moist, mostly vegetal and very little lupulin compared to what they should be and after defrosting they smelt completely vegetal... (fresh cut, wet grass with a touch of dog shit mixed through it).