Attn expert dry hoppers: Please help with dry hopping grassiness

Hey all. I have been brewing all grain for about three years, mostly IPA's, with excellent results. I dry hopped almost every ipa, pale, and anything else i felt I could get away with it, and it added an exceptional flavor and aroma to my beers. However, recently, every batch that I have dry hopped has had a pronounced grassy flavor to it. I can't seem to put a finger on what changed, other than switching from bottling to kegging, so I was hoping that someone could tell me if they see an issue in my process:

1. Rack fermented IPA from primary to secondary on top of hop pellets
2. I usually use between 1-2 oz, mostly citra, simcoe, amarillo or cascade
3. Dry hop 5-8 days at 60-65 degrees
4. Move to ferm chamber to cold crash @ 40 degree for 1-2 days
5. Rack to keg and carb @ 34 degrees at 10 psi for 2 weeks
6. Taste, drink, bottle, ext at 2.5 - 3 weeks

Is there any reason that my beers would suddenly taste more grassy? I have become gun shy to dry hop, and the last few batches that I didn't dry hop suffered from lack of aroma. I even used gelatin in the keg to try to strip some of the grassy flavors with no luck.

Granted, the grassyness fades after about 5-6 weeks, but at that point the beer really doesn't even taste like an ipa and is just a sliver of the beer that it was at 3 weeks.

The only thing that I have changed recently is to go from bottle crabbing to kegging and force carbing. Could that make a difference or am I doing something else wrong, or am I just being inpatient? Thanks for the help!

RDWHAHB

Have you thought about just dry hopping in your keg? If your using pellets just throw them in while its carbing, if your using whole hops throw them in a bag and sink them with some weight if you can. The pellets will all drop out and you'll get some sludge with your first few pints then it should clear up.

My guess is that with kegging your drinking your beer much earlier than you would if you bottled where you would be waiting atleast 2-3 weeks minimum...

Perhaps you are just using a crop that is newer than what you were used to?

Valid points. I have dry hopped in the keg with whole cone but never pellets.

I think the closest guess could be that I just sampling the beer much sooner from the keg then I am from bottle conditioning and the flavors haven't conditioned enough.

thanks

That's probably it if you think so. I won't touch an IPA until 4 weeks just for this reason, and my contact time on dry hops is 3-4 days, tops.

4-7 weeks after bottling/kegging seems to be the best time to drink, then the aromas/perceived flavors fade from there(this time in an undesired way).

With that said, I just had the last IPA from a batch that was ready to drink early september, and it was fantastic. I was really surprised how enjoyable it was, but like you say, it was a sliver of its former self. It most certainly still tasted like an IPA though.

Yeah, if you had good results and are now getting poor results with the same methodology then I would look at the freshness of the hops that you are using.

I started ordering in bulk around harvest time and storing in vacuum-sealed jars in the freezer. Actually saves a lot of money over buying them as needed (~$0.75 per oz vs $2 per oz at the LHBS) and I have more control over how they are stored and handled.

Not sure about why it would be suddenly different. I have heard it said that grassiness is chlorophyll you're tasting and that it can happen with hop pellets because they are shredded they expose more chlorophyll than whole hops do. I use pellets exclusively and have not noticed any grass flavors though.

I dont like to dry hop in the keg at cold temps. The dry hoping is not very noticeable when I do it that way. But I wonder as it has been said here if you have a bad batch of hops. Where do you buy yours and how are they stored? I have noticed a big change in hop quality from different companies. I have never had any problems with 7 days.

Maybe ease back on the days the hops are sitting in the beer. 8 days sounds like a long time. Ive read here and in books that all hop goodness is extracted by 3 days. I never dry hop more than 4 days.

This has happened a few times to us, and it's usually either been:

1) A huge dry hop (1# per BBL+)
2) Too long a contact time
3) Dry-hopping cold (can't remember the science behind this, but I distinctly remember reading cold temps can extract more grassy notes)

It looks like you're fine on 1 and 3, so my only guess would be to try shortening the contact time. Are you able to taste it daily during the dry hop?

3. Dry hop 5-8 days at 60-65 degrees
4. Move to ferm chamber to cold crash @ 40 degree for 1-2 days

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What about dry-hopping directly into the primary, then after a couple days transferring over to secondary before crashing?

I'm wondering if the extended contact time in addition to the few days at cold temps is what's bringing out the grassy notes.

I think the cold temps and extended time could be the culprit.

Until a month ago I had a crap job at a brewery, but one of the luxuries was as many hops as you want are yours to take home. They are all fresh, directly sourced from hop union in yakima and I'm in seattle.

Idk if the freshness of the hops is the problem because they were all used with good results at a commercial brewery.

I do my best to keep the secondary at 64 but last night I checked a pale ale that was dh and it was down to 58.

Culprit of a cold house, expensive heat bill and lack of ferm activity.

I got grassy flavors when i added too much hops in the late boil or flame out. Ive dry hopped for 1 or even 2 weeks with whole hops & tasted/smelled great. But i do have one that has been dry hopping for 2 weeks so i'll cold crash & keg that very soon.

There is some talk in another thread that the 2013 crop of Amarillo hops have overly grassy notes this year. Maybe that is the contributing factor to your issues.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f12/grassy-2013-amarillo-hops-446744/

One of the biggest advantages of kegging is being able to drink IPAs sooner, at the peak of freshness. Waiting longer kinda defeats the purpose, IMO.

If I get grassy/vegetal, it's usually because of old hops. Never gotten it from long contact time or low temps (I love dry hopping cold). Just my experience though, nothing scientific.

TyTanium said:

One of the biggest advantages of kegging is being able to drink IPAs sooner, at the peak of freshness. Waiting longer kinda defeats the purpose, IMO.

If I get grassy/vegetal, it's usually because of old hops. Never gotten it from long contact time or low temps (I love dry hopping cold). Just my experience though, nothing scientific.

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/\ Exactly what I have always been told, its best to drink ipas between 2-4 weeks from packaging, so waiting until 5 weeks seems to defeat the purpose. At that point the hops, including the grassiness will have melted away and Ill be left with mostly malt.

I also didn't consider that this could not be dry hop related. With the abundance of free hops I have I have been trying to move last years crop to make room for 2013 and have been doing some huge hop bursted monsters. like 5 oz in the last 5 mins, 2 at KO with 30 min aroma steep. I suppose that could also add to the grassiness. Looks like I have some experiments to run!

bluelakebrewing said:

/\ Exactly what I have always been told, its best to drink ipas between 2-4 weeks from packaging, so waiting until 5 weeks seems to defeat the purpose. At that point the hops, including the grassiness will have melted away and Ill be left with mostly malt.

I also didn't consider that this could not be dry hop related. With the abundance of free hops I have I have been trying to move last years crop to make room for 2013 and have been doing some huge hop bursted monsters. like 5 oz in the last 5 mins, 2 at KO with 30 min aroma steep. I suppose that could also add to the grassiness. Looks like I have some experiments to run!

Click to expand...

This is basically how I like to brew my house IPA, and this is why I need to wait longer.

I generally use a normal bittering charge, then nothing until knockout. For a 6G batch (5 into packaging) 3-5oz addition depending on what I'm going for, 30m steep.

Then dry hops are multi-stage, 3-4oz at a shot for 3-4 days, twice.

Drinking a beer like this after 2 weeks is just asking for knives to the throat, but it lends to a final product that has incredible aroma/perceived flavor with less focus on bitterness. One just has to be patient for the beer to meld. Bitterness doesn't even come through for a while, malts cannot be tasted through the wall of hops. IME, If Citra or NS hops are used they will dominate the beer at this point. Too many variables exist for a blanket statement to be issued.

So sure, go on and drink the hop bombs early if you can convince yourself, just depending on your brew style you may be wasting it. I choose to wait for my own definition of peak flavor, which is the ability to taste everything I put into the beer as intended.

Now, my house APA I can drink after 2 weeks. It's not at peak, but it's very close. This however, is a completely different beer than what is listed above.

Also, I don't even notice aromas/flavors dropping under desired levels for at least 7-8 weeks. It's gradual, aromas don't magically disappear on some arbitrary date after packaging. There is a block of time when changes are minimal, this is what you need to find within your own context. For my IPA's it is roughly 4-7 weeks after packaging, YMMV.

These are my own anecdotes, and should not be taken as fact for everybody. There are far too many variables in brewing.