Anyone used crystal hops?

[matt76]

Anyone used these, if so, in what out of interest?

The American stout I've got in the FV at the moment called for Magnum for bittering, crystal hops for flavour and Amarillo at flameout.

I got a 100g bag of crystal leaf hops and used them as per the recipe, just wondering how to use the rest. A bit of googling implies it's a US grown lager hop (it's used this way in a few GH recipes) although Hopslist suggests it's more versatile than that - I'm considering using some in a bitter as a late-ish flavour addition (probably with Magnum again for bittering)

Anyone else got any experience with them?

Cheers,

Matt

 

[Northern_Brewer]

The Septics put quite a lot of effort into breeding "better" lager hops in the 1980s and came out with a bunch of derivatives of the German classics that were better agronomically, such as Liberty, Mt Hood, Ultra - and Crystal.

I've had the odd single-hop Crystal ale and my memory is that I was pretty underwhelmed - it's certainly not interesting enough to be the star of the show. Probably best in a supporting role, or in eg a Belgian or something. I guess it would be ideal for an American hefe - Blue Moon clone or similar.