Chairman Cheyco

Recipes 

Does that mean that you wait until hot break to add your hops? I guess If you do 90 minute boils that would be the case. I never thought of how hot break affected hop profile.

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Brewpastor

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My practice is to get my boil going and not add my hops until after hot break. Then I add the first hops and start the timer. My boils then generally end up being a TOTAL of 90 minutes or so, but hopped boil is generally in the 60 minute range.

Hot break is a coagulating of proteins and as this happens hop resin is also taken up, reducing the amount of resin available to be utilized. This is a factor one should take into account. It doesn't mean that adding hops before break is wrong, simply if you add them after break you will have a different result.

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Twabe

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Actually, on this batch I put 2 oz of the Norther Brewer in the liquor cooler (if this is the right term), pre-boil. A brewer from a local microbrewery suggested this.

I was wondering too, is the boil essentially for hop flavor & evaporation, or does it have another function?

Lost

Recipes 

The boil causes proteins to precipitate out of the beer - this is your hot and cold break. It also cooks off some bad tasting chemicals (i.e. DMS) and extracts hop alpha acids (bitterness). Oh an it makes the batch nice and sterile so you can try and make sure the only bugs that get into it are the yeasties.

There's probably some other stuff going on but this is what immediately came to my mind.

Do a search for FWH (first wort hopping) and mash hopping - adding the hops to the Hot liquor tank would roughly equate to mash hopping. People have various opinions about these practices - some (me) think it's a waste of perfectly good hops. Others swear it adds something unique or smooth to the beer.

sonvolt

Recipes 

I never thought about doing that! I think I am going to try it on my next brew.

StephenK1957

Recipes 

I first used the small C-clamps used in woodworking to help regulate the outflow from the lauter tun during fly sparging. Worked pretty well, too.

Pimp Juice

Recipes 

Plus it gets damned messy if it breaks with hops. My only boil overs were when I added the hops before the hot break.

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Twabe

Recipes 

Thanks for the tips on crimping the outflow, I'll try that next brew day.

-t-