onion and garlic hops

I have a friend willing to pick me a bunch of unknown hops. He brought in a sample and they look good but have a strong garlic and onion smell. Should I pass on this deal or do they just need some time on the vine?

I have a patch of wild hops in my back yard that I just picked. They smell "hoppy" yet they have a distinct garlic type smell too. I have no idea whether to use them or not. I tried making a hop tea and it maintained the funky odor and was very bitter. Trying to figure out if their worth using in a batch.

I am going to make a 1 liter beer with some dme and about 8 grams of wet hops. It should give me an idea of if the funk will stay.

I've found wild hops growing in a few locations from Upstate New York down here to Ohio and they all seem to be very similar in growth habit and cone structure along with the onion/garlic aroma (what I get is BO which could be sensed by others as onion). After growing a few of these for a few years it seems that the window for picking them at the right point is very tight and they go from smelling 'hoppy' to garlic/onion in a very very few short days. Most all have a lot of reddish to the stem and petioles with 5-7 lobed leaves which are cut pretty deeply and I'm assuming they're all related to a common 'type' that is native to the region. Like kaconga, I'd make a small batch rather than chancing 5 gallons or so with an unknown variety. Mine didn't turn out well but that's only one opinion so have at it!!

Update on my 1L test. Took a sample today and it smelled of cheese or something. Taste was reminiscent of wet gym socks or something. My wife was picking up apple but my mom thought it smelled rotten. In a funky way it wasn't completely objectionable. LHBS guy said it might work in a saison.

Personally I just cannot see using these. Will wait it out and let one carb but my window is dwindling as the weather turns colder. On a plus side my mom has a friend with hops. Hopefully those will pan out.

They must have been poisonous. No one has commented since... :cross:

I am alive and have decided to not use off smelling hops. Ordered a few pounds of leaf hops from hops direct and am looking forward to making some beer this weekend.

I heard along the way that the garlic smell comes from them being overly ripe and starting to flower.

Makes sense considering how late it was in the season. Hopefully I can score some free hops next august/September since I know people growing them now.

m_c_zero said:

I heard along the way that the garlic smell comes from them being overly ripe and starting to flower.

Click to expand...

Overly ripe, perhaps, but there's no chance of flowering. That happened before the cones even formed...

Cheers!