No Chill Hop Utilization

[buttersd70]

mmm. It's an interesting subject. When it was first raised, I looked at thirsty's post, and the science geek in me went...."yep, that makes sense. It's logical, based on scientific principle, it must be right.".....It's the empirical results that, to me, contradict scientific logic. Thats the thing that interests me about it.....logically, and scientifically, TB is absolutely right. It should introduce more bitterness. I'll not dispute what he's saying. In theory, the Blue team wins hands down......
But I'm going off empirical results (which makes a change for me....I'm a theoretical numbers kinda guy....).
I'm not super-passionate about this, I'm well open on the subject. And in the interest of impartiality, I will say that the highest alpha hop I've used in late additions is around the 8% mark.....so there may be merit in the theory, as far as high alpha hopping is concerned. I've not tried a high alpha in late addition, nor have I tried ridiculously (ie...flame suit on....american style B) ) high late additions......

For the record, the most (late hop additions that I have used) has been a/ 1.5 g/L ~5%AA; and b/ 0.75g/L ~8%AA ; at 15 and 5 mins. Same for each.

I say this in order to be completely open about what I have tried, in NC vs Rapid chill....so that each brewer can draw conclusion from relevant data, instead of supposition....

 

[SpillsMostOfIt]

I say this in order to be completely open <snip> ... so that each brewer can draw conclusion from relevant data, instead of supposition....

I'm sorry, but there is simply no place for that sort of behaviour here. Remember, this is the Internet and supposition is at the very core of what we do.

 

[buttersd70]

I'm sorry, but there is simply no place for that sort of behaviour here. Remember, this is the Internet and supposition is at the very core of what we do.

bbbaaaaaaaawwwwwwhhhhh!!
:lol:
You now need to do my laundry for me.....as I just befouled myself concurrently from multiple orifices at the same time.... :lol:

 

[joecast]

Im not afraid of a bit of bitterness, but i did notice an increase in percieved bitterness levels with no-chill with 'traditional' hopping regeims. Hence after reading many posts in this forum i went with a 20 min calculation for all brews that have any hop material that makes it into the cube.

Along with butters and many others, I find that with this method, (with my setup, recipies and equipment) Aroma is subdued a little. So to compensate i will dry hop in the fermenter/seccondary/keg, or just like i did way back with kits, bung them into the coffee plunger for couple of min and add while racking.

Leary

after 3 no chill brews this seems to be closest to what i have experienced. my last brew i added 20g centennial at 1min and 10g dry hop. should have done it the other way around, or even all 30g dry hop as there was already a 10min addition as well. i dont mind the bitterness, but would love more aroma.

 

[Thirsty Boy]

mmm. It's an interesting subject. When it was first raised, I looked at thirsty's post, and the science geek in me went...."yep, that makes sense. It's logical, based on scientific principle, it must be right.".....It's the empirical results that, to me, contradict scientific logic. Thats the thing that interests me about it.....logically, and scientifically, TB is absolutely right. It should introduce more bitterness. I'll not dispute what he's saying. In theory, the Blue team wins hands down......
But I'm going off empirical results (which makes a change for me....I'm a theoretical numbers kinda guy....).
I'm not super-passionate about this, I'm well open on the subject. And in the interest of impartiality, I will say that the highest alpha hop I've used in late additions is around the 8% mark.....so there may be merit in the theory, as far as high alpha hopping is concerned. I've not tried a high alpha in late addition, nor have I tried ridiculously (ie...flame suit on....american style B) ) high late additions......

For the record, the most (late hop additions that I have used) has been a/ 1.5 g/L ~5%AA; and b/ 0.75g/L ~8%AA ; at 15 and 5 mins. Same for each.

I say this in order to be completely open about what I have tried, in NC vs Rapid chill....so that each brewer can draw conclusion from relevant data, instead of supposition....

Thats the thing that is both confusing and interesting about this - the empirical results seem to be different for different people.

I can build the best theoretical case in the world for the blue team - but that doesn't matter a squirt if like Butters, you weren't noticing a difference anyway.

On the other hand, the reason I started thinking about this was only because I did notice a difference - the rest has just been tweaking to try and fit the different experiences people have described into my theorising - its still got some pretty obvious holes though.

mckenry - the best thing to do I think, would be to brew to the recipe you have found/developed, as though there were no difference at all. See how it turns out. If you are happy with it... then there is nothing to change. Then just brew a lot and experiment.

Didn't get the aroma you were looking for? ... might be the NC, might be something else. If you can never get the aroma you are looking for. Then this might be a reason. You could fix it with cube hops - or dry hops - or an Ultra Late hop into the fermentor - or just more late hops - or by rapid chilling instead of NC or - probably 5 different other ways.

If its usually fine, but in six months you cube up a batch that has 60g of late chinook, and it turns out a stack more bitter than you were expecting ... then this might be a reason. Or maybe you just find chinook harsh - or maybe your normal hops are old and these were fresh....

In a year - try a recipe you have done a few times - Use the hops you usually use and stick the late hops in a hop sock and whack it in the cube instead of late in the boil. See what it does to your aroma, see how much it affects your bitterness.

Try an experiment where you late hop the hell out of a beer - cube half of it and chill the other half. See how they compare.


Me - I avoid the late kettle hops a bit and get my flavour & aroma from cube hopping and Ultra Late hopping... but thats just me. What I do is "right" because I know it works. But its not exclusively right - almost nothing in brewing is. Sorry

TB

 

[mckenry]

mckenry - the best thing to do I think, would be to brew to the recipe you have found/developed, as though there were no difference at all. See how it turns out. If you are happy with it... then there is nothing to change. Then just brew a lot and experiment.

Try an experiment where you late hop the hell out of a beer - cube half of it and chill the other half. See how they compare.

TB

Yep, fark it. I am from scientific background and love a side-by-side. Even though these days its all I.T. and budget forcasts :angry:
I am gonna cube half a batch with no flameout, the other half with regular flameout addition. Both no-chill.
With the no flameout I am going to strain the same amount of hops plunger style into secondary (approx day 5) and see if I can ramp up the aroma over the regular hop schedule.
This will be an experiment proper as I can prove repeatability, but the sample pool will be just uno

 

[mckenry]

mckenry - the best thing to do I think, would be to brew to the recipe you have found/developed, as though there were no difference at all. See how it turns out. If you are happy with it... then there is nothing to change. Then just brew a lot and experiment.

Try an experiment where you late hop the hell out of a beer - cube half of it and chill the other half. See how they compare.

TB

Yep, fark it. I am from scientific background and love a side-by-side. Even though these days its all I.T. and budget forcasts :angry:
I am gonna cube half a batch with no flameout, the other half with regular flameout addition. Both no-chill.
With the no flameout I am going to strain the same amount of hops plunger style into secondary (approx day 5) and see if I can ramp up the aroma over the regular hop schedule.
This will be an experiment proper as I can prove repeatability, but the sample pool will be just uno

1st taste today of above experiment.
Sorry, I seriously cant tell the difference. SWMBO poured the beers, knowing which keg was which & I couldnt tell. I didnt want to have any preconceived ideas on which one 'should have more aroma or more bitterness etc'. I thought she was having a lend by pouring two from the same keg.
I then poured one from each keg, turned my back while she moved them around and I cannot tell them apart.
Sample pool of 1 does not the generate greatest confidence, but for me, it'll do. No need to go to the extra effort I say.
Remember, it'll do ME. My wife can pick up slight changes of bittermess better than I can, but also agrees these are so close, it's not worth splitting hairs.
Anyone else done this experiment since this thread?
mckenry

 

[Quintrex]

1st taste today of above experiment.
Sorry, I seriously cant tell the difference. SWMBO poured the beers, knowing which keg was which & I couldnt tell. I didnt want to have any preconceived ideas on which one 'should have more aroma or more bitterness etc'. I thought she was having a lend by pouring two from the same keg.
I then poured one from each keg, turned my back while she moved them around and I cannot tell them apart.
Sample pool of 1 does not the generate greatest confidence, but for me, it'll do. No need to go to the extra effort I say.
Remember, it'll do ME. My wife can pick up slight changes of bittermess better than I can, but also agrees these are so close, it's not worth splitting hairs.
Anyone else done this experiment since this thread?
mckenry

My current thoughts on the matter are this, take as you will. I think it depends what beer you brew as I'd say for each addition of hops you have in a brew by no-chilling, the dissolved alpha acids will spend an extra ~10ish minutes in the temp-zone where they are/can be isomerized and so for multiple additions this can throw out your bitterness. What i think matters is having the ability to reproduce brews and then we can just becomes a matter of recipe tweaking.
Nice work on doing your experiment?

Thirsty did you end up doing that follow up experiment?

Q

 

[mckenry]

a brew by no-chilling, the dissolved alpha acids will spend an extra ~10ish minutes in the temp-zone where they are/can be isomerized and so for multiple additions this can throw out your bitterness.

Thats what I was (and I think most were) expecting and it makes sense, but with my APA, I couldnt tell. If someone can be bothered doing this with a lager I'll be happy to take on board advise/results as gospel.

 

[clean brewer]

Bittering - 60+ mins from end of boil
Flavour - 0-10 mins
Aroma - put some hops in a cup of boiling water for 5 minutes, strain and add to the secondary fermenter/bottleing bucket/keg (to paraphase Philip).

Ive been doing it this way except, bittering is at 45mins.. I adjusted it like this as when I did my 1st AG and No-chilled, I found it was quite bitter and thats about it...

Seems to work well now...

 

[Thirsty Boy]

My current thoughts on the matter are this, take as you will. I think it depends what beer you brew as I'd say for each addition of hops you have in a brew by no-chilling, the dissolved alpha acids will spend an extra ~10ish minutes in the temp-zone where they are/can be isomerized and so for multiple additions this can throw out your bitterness. What i think matters is having the ability to reproduce brews and then we can just becomes a matter of recipe tweaking.
Nice work on doing your experiment?

Thirsty did you end up doing that follow up experiment?

Q

not yet, will get around to it one of these days when I have a spare hour or two to burn - not forgotten, just low priority.

However - a little more anecdotal stuff

Last brew I did (american wheat) had no boil hops at all, only cube hops calculated as though they were 20 min additions - under bitter from my target, but not horribly so. Tweaked it with some tetra and about 5 IBUs worth brought it up to snuff. Equates to about 25% of my 20IBU target so calculating as a 15 min addition would have been nearly on the money.

Thats hops into the actual cube though - so only minimal relevance to mckenry's experience

 

[buttersd70]

1st taste today of above experiment.
Sorry, I seriously cant tell the difference. SWMBO poured the beers, knowing which keg was which & I couldnt tell. I didnt want to have any preconceived ideas on which one 'should have more aroma or more bitterness etc'. I thought she was having a lend by pouring two from the same keg.
I then poured one from each keg, turned my back while she moved them around and I cannot tell them apart.
Sample pool of 1 does not the generate greatest confidence, but for me, it'll do. No need to go to the extra effort I say.
Remember, it'll do ME. My wife can pick up slight changes of bittermess better than I can, but also agrees these are so close, it's not worth splitting hairs.
Anyone else done this experiment since this thread?
mckenry

Mckenry...can we get your recipe, hop alpha and schedules, to put it into perspective?

 

[SpillsMostOfIt]

not yet, will get around to it one of these days when I have a spare hour or two to burn - not forgotten, just low priority.

However - a little more anecdotal stuff

Last brew I did (american wheat) had no boil hops at all, only cube hops calculated as though they were 20 min additions - under bitter from my target, but not horribly so. Tweaked it with some tetra and about 5 IBUs worth brought it up to snuff. Equates to about 25% of my 20IBU target so calculating as a 15 min addition would have been nearly on the money.

Thats hops into the actual cube though - so only minimal relevance to mckenry's experience

My cube-hopped beer was and remains disappointing. I worked it all on 20min additions into the cube and it is underbittered, underflavoured and undersmelly. I'm drinking it, but not offering it to guests. Good thing I don't have too many guests these days!

Now, this contrasts starkly with a previous experiment where I added some purportedly aroma-hops into the cube and I got no aroma, but more bitterness.

I'm tending towards steering clear of putting any hops in my cubes - primarily because of my fear of failure and my current levels of fear...

 

[Bribie G]

Depending on the style of the beer I am having great results adding hop tea a few days before bottling (should work even better with kegging) to boost aroma and some flavour, but only using the freshest aroma hops I can obtain. Older and non - aroma hops can contain Beta acids that are bitter as-is and don't need isomerisation so can add unwanted bitterness. Make some hop tea with some older hops and taste some, you will soon be pulling funny faces from the bitterness.

Flowers e.g. BSaaz work best.

 

[blackbock]

Flowers e.g. BSaaz work best.

I'll second that one.

 

[mckenry]

Mckenry...can we get your recipe, hop alpha and schedules, to put it into perspective?

It was based on Back Yard Brewers Simcoe APA. Scaled down to 22L.
After the 10 min addition, waited 10 mins, drew off 11L and then added the 5 & o mins at flameout (but only half the hops as 11L were drawn off already) as per usual to the wort.
I also used 1272 American Ale II.

So the only real mod is that I didnt have a 5 min addition, a slightly bigger flameout addition.

Sorry I cant you give you my AA, (I'm away with work til Saturday) but I assume they'd be pretty close to BYB's.
Let me know if you need exact AA and I'll provide on Sunday or Monday.
mckenry

 

[rich_lamb]

I've been making a few (moderately) low gravity beers lately with only bittering additions at 60 min, and I go straight from the kettle to the cube (while filtering) so I have the worst case "cube isomerisation" going on. These beers have been typically 20-30IBU as a guide - not exceptionally bitter.

Note that my first no-chill which was not filtered and had all the hop residue in the cube was WAY more bitter than target, so it does depend on how much of the hop matter gets through.

It's pretty subjective, but I would suggest the latest beers are more bitter than expected though not grossly so. I think treating 45 minute additions as 60 minute might work well, and when I need aroma I will probably use the "hop tea" method as it strikes me as offering the best control.

 

[Fourstar]

I'm tending towards steering clear of putting any hops in my cubes - primarily because of my fear of failure and my current levels of fear...

Hey Spills,

I cube hop all of my beers now.

Bittering (boil 60mins)
Flavour at (sub 10mins, flameout or whirlpool)
Aroma - added to cube when wort is below 70deg.

The last beer I did, a Cascade APA was cube hopped with 30g cascade @ 64 deg. The aroma is fantastic, equivilant of a whirlpool or hopback addition still had some grassyness to it too.... very nice.

 

[SpillsMostOfIt]

The last beer I did, a Cascade APA was cube hopped with 30g cascade @ 64 deg. The aroma is fantastic, equivilant of a whirlpool or hopback addition still had some grassyness to it too.... very nice.

Perhaps I just need to fail more - at least I get to drink my failures.

Realistically, I have never been able to replicate your success in this way. I find it interesting that so many people get such different results.

For hoppy beers, I will probably return to lots of flameout additions and cube-chilling as I have a near endless water supply (bore with what I understand to be a 1-100 year surface to aquifer cycle, but that is getting too off topic even for me).

I've not considered opening the cube at that sort of temp. I tend to leave it sealed until I tip it all out and feed the yeast...

 

[Fourstar]

I've not considered opening the cube at that sort of temp. I tend to leave it sealed until I tip it all out and feed the yeast...

Personally i think for the length of time I have the cube open, in a consealed draft-free area im quite safe. I quickly add my hops, I then reseal the cube once more and purge all air out (as much as possible) of the cube as well.

I have yet to have a batch go belly up (6 so far with this method). The chances of it picking up something would probably be less than that of those who religiously no chill in their fermenter h34r: .