Dry Hopping

[afox]

Hi guys,

I’m makin a West Coast pale ale. I’ve fermented for 11days and now I’ve racked into a secondary (primarily because the yeast cake was massive). I’ve then added 160g of whole leaf hops and they seem to just float on top.

I tried a gently to introduce them but they mostly float above the water line. Will they sink at all, as I’m concerned if the full aroma potential wont be achieved unless they do?

Cheers

 

[Slid]

Hi guys,

I’m makin a West Coast pale ale. I’ve fermented for 11days and now I’ve racked into a secondary (primarily because the yeast cake was massive). I’ve then added 160g of whole leaf hops and they seem to just float on top.

I tried a gently to introduce them but they mostly float above the water line. Will they sink at all, as I’m concerned if the full aroma potential wont be achieved unless they do?

Cheers

If you leave them for 5 days, it is difficult to see any of them avoiding the wort.

If you insist, sterilise a long spoon and stir them in so that they are at least wet.

 

[Graz]

Hi guys,

I’m makin a West Coast pale ale. I’ve fermented for 11days and now I’ve racked into a secondary (primarily because the yeast cake was massive). I’ve then added 160g of whole leaf hops and they seem to just float on top.

I tried a gently to introduce them but they mostly float above the water line. Will they sink at all, as I’m concerned if the full aroma potential wont be achieved unless they do?

Cheers

I dry hopped a kit beer (Beerworks Suffolk Ale) last night that came with leaf hops instead of pellets. The instructions said to break them up with a knife and soak in boiling water first. Instead I put them in our mini food blender and chopped them up to a fairly fine consistency that way. Then put them in a jug with some boiled water and let them sit for a while before adding to the fermenter. There was sufficient sludge that some of it must have sank to the bottom but a good layer on top of the beer too. It will be fine though as the wort will soak into them and leech out the flavour.

I wouldn't be overly concerned with what you've done but maybe next time it might be a good idea to pulverise them.

 

[Toxophilly]

I wouldn't be overly concerned with what you've done but maybe next time it might be a good idea to pulverise them.

Or just buy pellet hops where the pulverization has been done for you. I've found pellet hops to be far superior for dry hopping for the reasons described.

You can stir leaf hops in as suggested but you'll be introducing oxygen in doing so which is counter-productive to the hop aroma you're trying to achieve by dry hopping.:nono:

Pellets are the one for dry hopping :thumb:

 

[Norfolk79]

I use pellet hops and just throw them in. No real cold crashing done and they fall nicely to the bottom by the time I bottle it a week or so later.

 

[peebee]

Hi guys,

I’m makin a West Coast pale ale. I’ve fermented for 11days and now I’ve racked into a secondary (primarily because the yeast cake was massive). I’ve then added 160g of whole leaf hops and they seem to just float on top.

I tried a gently to introduce them but they mostly float above the water line. Will they sink at all, as I’m concerned if the full aroma potential wont be achieved unless they do?

Cheers

It's the same problem I had when first attempting one of these "new" American styles. A "Dead Pony Club" clone (from DIYDog). The hops went in (to the secondary, or actually the locked down conical), and five days later were still floating dry as a bone. So I used a large sterilised metal spoon to pat them down below the surface (not stirred, that worried me) and left them for a further three days.

I then ordered some "hop spiders" (the 70mm diameter, 300mm long ones from Amazon but you can get the same from EBay, etc., they'll fit into Corney kegs if I want) plus some marbles to weigh them down. And I'll use pellets next time as I was a bit worried by the amount of air & oxygen whole (blitzed) hops carried with them. Work-in-progress.

The finished "Dead Pony Club" clone was very nice but quite unlike the Brewdog version, which I guess is because some of the dry hops extracted better than others during this treatment.

 

[pms67]

I use pellet hops and just throw them in. No real cold crashing done and they fall nicely to the bottom by the time I bottle it a week or so later.

Nailed it, pellets all the time,I will never use leaf hops again if I can help it

 

[DoctorMick]

I always try to use pellets for dry hopping but if I do use leaf I put them in a sanitised nylon bag with some tea spoons to weigh them down. You’ve got to be careful not to overfill the bag otherwise the hops in the middle don’t get wet. It’s a really simple way to do it and makes it a lot easier when transferring the beer as there are no blockages.