�£10 worth of hops minimum?

The Homebrew Forum

Help Support The Homebrew Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
I have made some pretty bursty ones with only 100-150

There are variables though.. bagging hops IMO reduces them quite a bit I find.. Pellets vs leaf.

What processes do you do?
 
I started adding more hops to my Lagers and found out i don't like them as much. I do know what you mean about more hops though, i think you get immune to them. Try doing a 15,5 and flamout and see if that improves the taste. An 80c steep is also a good idea. I have just done a NEIPA with over 600g so hoping for something in your face.
 
Sounds like your turning into an American :lol:

Like beercat says I think the secret is to add as much of your hops later in the boil. I've even heard of people not adding any bittering hops and adding all the hops as flavour/aroma/whirlpool additions. I think it's called hop bursting
 
I started adding more hops to my Lagers and found out i don't like them as much. I do know what you mean about more hops though, i think you get immune to them. Try doing a 15,5 and flamout and see if that improves the taste. An 80c steep is also a good idea. I have just done a NEIPA with over 600g so hoping for something in your face.

Actually you do. There's a term for getting more and more used to increasing amounts of hop bitterness. I cant remember what it's called now
 
Actually you do. There's a term for getting more and more used to increasing amounts of hop bitterness. I cant remember what it's called now

Whatever its called i am suffering from it! :) An affect i have noticed from increasing the hops in a Lager or Kolsch is that they take months to condition. Its not like an IPA where you drink it quick before the taste dulls. I guess its a completely different balance your going after in the beer so not really comparable.
 
Actually you do. There's a term for getting more and more used to increasing amounts of hop bitterness. I cant remember what it's called now
Lupulin Threshold Shift.

"Inspiration is the impact of a fact on a well-prepared mind" Louis Pasteur
 
It's tricky to match commercial brewers until you start force carbonation and purging everything with co2 when packaging. Oxygen pickup and priming just kills hops. Otherwise, the best thing you can do is throw loads of hops in at flame out and dry hop, then drink it quickly.

Since swapping to force carbing in corny and bottling with a blichmann beer gun, my hop flavour and aroma has become so much more stable.

"Inspiration is the impact of a fact on a well-prepared mind" Louis Pasteur
 
My price per bottle is creeping up 😄
Probably end up at 50p per bottle which is still decent.
I may do an insane hop filled brew and end up at £1 per bottle
 
My price per bottle is creeping up 😄
Probably end up at 50p per bottle which is still decent.
I may do an insane hop filled brew and end up at £1 per bottle

£1 a bottle?!?!? £40-£46 a brew? I did an 5.5% ABV APA with 150g hops - the grain was as a GEB custom kit at £6, the hops cost me £7 and the yeast £1 from CML. That’s £14 (about 30p if I get a full 46 bottles, 35p if it just gets me 40).

By my calculations, and there are discounts to be had for buying higher quantities, you’d need a brew with more than 750g of hops to hit £1 a bottle!
 
Are you after more hop character, as in a 'brighter' hop flavour? Or are you after a beer which tastes of hops? If it's the latter then yeah you'll be best of putting in more hops.

The former is about creating a balanced beer which doesn't necessarily rely on using loads of hops for flavour, but optimising usage. As others have mentioned, this involves getting addition timings and quantities right (as in the right quantity at the right time), playing around with the bittering hop time, but also the yeast used and the FV temp can have an affect on hop character, as well as carbonation.

I've managed to get much better hop character using lager yeasts than US-05, even in beers which don't have many hops. Carbonation brings out the hop character better, which is why IPAs mostly taste better from keg than cask.

I was in America recently and a lot of IPAs were heavily hopped and off balance, and they tasted like someone was fisting grass clippings down my throat. I'm noticing that more here as well. I much prefer balance but hoppy in an IPA.
 
Yeast can also play a big part in the hops too like I have said before Nottingham, / Gervin / Wilko, I believe is a little suppressive on hop flavours.

Using MJ44 or US 05 I have found I can get a decent hop hit with as little as 100 grams - 150 great...
 
I find if you lay off hoppy beers for a couple of weeks your taste buds return. I have also found that I have made really nice hoppy beers with 100-150g of hops but my 350g of hops beers haven't tasted as hoppy so I agree with having a balance
 
£1 a bottle?!?!? £40-£46 a brew? I did an 5.5% ABV APA with 150g hops - the grain was as a GEB custom kit at £6, the hops cost me £7 and the yeast £1 from CML. That’s £14 (about 30p if I get a full 46 bottles, 35p if it just gets me 40).

By my calculations, and there are discounts to be had for buying higher quantities, you’d need a brew with more than 750g of hops to hit £1 a bottle!
Greg Hughes does a brew with 600 grams,imperial IPA I think
 
My 'thrift IPA/APA' is a clone of Hit The Lights by Weird Beard. They kindly gave me the recipe.

The reason it is thrifty is that, whilst it uses 210g of hops in a 19l brew, they are Aurora, Nugget and Target, all available for £2.50- £3.00 per 100g. It is a nice brew and with cml yeast and brewers select grain can be made for less than £9.20/19l or 24p per bottle.
 
£1 a bottle?!?!? £40-£46 a brew? I did an 5.5% ABV APA with 150g hops - the grain was as a GEB custom kit at £6, the hops cost me £7 and the yeast £1 from CML. That’s £14 (about 30p if I get a full 46 bottles, 35p if it just gets me 40).

By my calculations, and there are discounts to be had for buying higher quantities, you’d need a brew with more than 750g of hops to hit £1 a bottle!

If you choose decent hops,Citra,Amarillo,Mosaic etc and a liquid yeast the cost shoots up but cost isn’t really the reason I brew,I guess if I didn’t brew I would more than happily pay £1 for a belter of a beer rather than 30-70p for an ok one.
 

Latest posts

Back
Top