grassy 2013 Amarillo hops

Hey Folks: I jumped on a pound of fresh leaf Amarillo hops this year(2013 hops) from Hops Direct when I saw that HD had them in stock. I know they don't last long. When I got them I made an all Amarillo hopped pale ale. Upon inspecting the hops I thought they smelled grassy with little hop smell. I went ahead and made the beer. Well I just tapped the keg and a pure grassy flavor. I was totally bummed. Anyone else have this problem this season with Amarillo???
I think the problem is that they were harvested to early. Almost too much green. As much as I love this hop I might end up trashing the the rest of the pound.
FWIW: not trying to trash talk Hops Direct, they have been nothing but excellent. I think they get Amarillo from another grower. This seems to be a bummer batch. Such a great hop. Am I alone or have others experienced this?

I'm doing an Amarillo hop pale next with 2013 HD crop. Will let you know once I brew it

241 said:

I'm doing an Amarillo hop pale next with 2013 HD crop. Will let you know once I brew it

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What does it smell like before you brew? I should have gone with my gut and STOPPED or at least changed the recipe. Eager to hear what you find.

That's a shame!

I have a pound of leaf and a pound of pellets from them, but haven't opened them up yet. They don't seem to grow Amarillo themselves as the PF logo is not on it. I also have a pound coming in from LabelPeelers, who source from HopUnion. That shipment is on its way and I'll compare the 2 batches when it arrives.

balto charlie said:

What does it smell like before you brew? I should have gone with my gut and STOPPED or at least changed the recipe. Eager to hear what you find.

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Mine are pellets, not leaf.

I'm waiting until brew day to open them. If they smell grassy I have others to use. My packaging does have their logo on it...

I got a pound back in 2011 that was herbal/grassy. Turned me off the variety completely.

Just ordered a pound of amarillo from HD as well, hopefully this isn't true for the whole crop. Will post back once I receive shipment/brew with it.

Rats, last week I got a pound of 2013 Amarillo from HD. I guess I'll have to run a batch of APA to try 'em out. I was going to save them 'till I used up my stock of 2012, the foil bags do keep them fresher than my Food Saver bags.

Anyone else have any feedback.

TOM

241 said:

[...]My packaging does have their logo on it...

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Yeah, all their bags have the standard company logo. But on the website many hops, including Amarillo, do not have the "PF" signature. So it's not grown on their farm.

Well, Amarillo is a patent hop so acreage limited.

I just dry hopped a red red pale ale with 2 oz. of amarillo and I'm not too thrilled with the results. They didn't provide a the hoppy aroma I was seeking and I can hardly taste any rye in the beer anymore. They were pellet hops from Midwest Supplies and are about 9 months old though, so that might be the case.

Dang, this is a bummer to read. I have a pound of them in my freezer from Hops Direct. Couldn't believe I could actually get a hold of a pound this year.
I thought last year's Chinook were grassy, unusual. Sounds like that's maybe what's happening here? I hope not. I have a simcoe/amarillo IPA planned to brew very soon.

Darn, I was in denial but mine are grassy too. I grabbed a pound of Amarillo leaf from Hops Direct so it must be the same crop.

Exact same problem here. Just brewed yesterday and upon opening the bag there was hoppy aroma only grass... Sucks. I got a pound too.

Bummer deal! I was looking forward to a pound of these from HopsDirect - I'd hate for them to be all grassy. If they're all grassy then I guess they're be reserved strictly for kettle hops

I'll try to remember to post back when I actually get around to trying mine out. I'd love to hear a post or two of encouragement with the 2013 HD Amarillo hops.

Hmm. Got a pound of 2013 from Farmhouse recently. Wonder what farm these came from? Will be brewing a Simcoe/Amarillo IPA next. Will report my findings.

zendog said:

Hmm. Got a pound of 2013 from Farmhouse recently. Wonder what farm these came from? Will be brewing a Simcoe/Amarillo IPA next. Will report my findings.

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I'm planning to brew a Simcarillo IPA as well. Haven't opened my Amarillo hops yet, but I think I know how they'll smell.
I thought last year's Chinook hops were grassy. Every beer I've brewed with them was harsh and I thought the hops smelled grassy/harsh; not the usual wonderful Chinook smell. Bummer...

IslandLizard said:

Yeah, all their bags have the standard company logo. But on the website many hops, including Amarillo, do not have the "PF" signature. So it's not grown on their farm.

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Amarillo is only grown on Virgil Gamache farms. They 'own' Amarillo. Hence the trademark on the name.

edit - so all Amarillo this year will probably be the same.

we've been researching a little on a UK craft beer facebook page. Although it's privately grown they said it took 32 days to harvest the crop. I guess some will be green and some will be very ripe - maybe if someone comes across a good quality pack, there's a chance the rest from that supplier won't be so green too. they have 4 distribution channels, hopefully one of us will update you on how the stuff exported to the UK is.

yup; I dry hopped a pale ale with this years amarillo, and it tastes horrible. Very grassy; and nothing like last years pleasant inviting aroma.

melodymaker said:

yup; I dry hopped a pale ale with this years amarillo, and it tastes horrible. Very grassy; and nothing like last years pleasant inviting aroma.

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Out of curiosity, were you using pellet or whole hops? It's been said that pellet have more "potential" to impart grassiness due to more surface area of the chlorophyll plant material, however I've never experienced intense grassiness in any hop except my home grown whole cascades.

Aside from that, in the past I've found grassy hops can be used safely on the hot side of things - just don't use them on the cool/cold side. I have some grassy cascade from last year that I've used successfully hot, but they impart a HUGE green tea flavor when used for dry hopping. Hopefully we can all get away with using our grassy Amarillo on the hot side (kinda lame we'd have to do this of course!).

melodymaker said:

yup; I dry hopped a pale ale with this years amarillo, and it tastes horrible. Very grassy; and nothing like last years pleasant inviting aroma.

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Shoot. I brewed the simcoe/amarillo IPA a few weeks ago, kegged it and keg hopped it with the same blend a couple days ago. It tasted fine when I kegged it, but now ya got me worried about dry hopping it. Maybe I should remove the hops; they've only been in there since 1/3, sat at 63F for a couple days.

Bummer. Even though it's not super fresh I have about 8 pounds of 2012 left... A lot will be used for the 20 Gallons of 120 I'm gonna brew once I finish setting up my conicals.

I'm still milking my 2012 Amarillo but I do have two pounds of 2013 in the freezer...guess I'll bust open one in see...anyone try contacting the farm?

I can't stand grassy. Arrrrgh

To follow up spoke with hopsdirect and they didn't deny the reports and said they have heard from numerous brewers that this years harvest does have strong grassy notes ....they just followed up with the standard hop varieties will vary year to year reply

The fact that I lost a pound in my shopping cart in 2012 sucked, but this is like salt on a wound

Drinking a PTE clone right now as I write this post in which the dry hop includes a 2oz addition of 2013 Amarillo pellets from Hops Direct (also have a pound of them in my freezer) and I am not getting any grassy notes at all. Granted there are a crap-load of other hops in it so maybe it is just being masked, but I would think I would pick up on it. So perhaps there is hope (?) or maybe I just got lucky with my crop.

*edit- I keep my hops in vacuumed sealed jars. I would crack open the Amarillo and see if I am picking up on the same thing you guys seem to be but I find once frozen I don't get much aroma unless I let them get to room temp.

opiate82 said:

Drinking a PTE clone right now as I write this post in which the dry hop includes a 2oz addition of 2013 Amarillo pellets from Hops Direct (also have a pound of them in my freezer) and I am not getting any grassy notes at all. Granted there are a crap-load of other hops in it so maybe it is just being masked, but I would think I would pick up on it. So perhaps there is hope (?) or maybe I just got lucky with my crop.

*edit- I keep my hops in vacuumed sealed jars. I would crack open the Amarillo and see if I am picking up on the same thing you guys seem to be but I find once frozen I don't get much aroma unless I let them get to room temp.

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Assuming that the usage was in dryhop based on recipes I've seen?

Edited to add durrr you said it in your post I quoted doh!

Hopefully this means there's some good Amarillo out there, which considering its an agricultural product it's not really surprising it's inconsistent. Sucks it seems there's possibly more bad then good but it reaffirms my practice of stockpiling.

I used whole hops. The batch I pitched to was made with a whole lot of 2012 amarillo hops... It was a double batch and I drank the first half and just recently kegged the second half after dry hopping with 2013 for a week... I only pitched an ounce and it is noticeably grassy and hardly citrus like at all on the pallette. Not what I was going for.

I should have really noticed when I took a whiff of the bag.. they barely had aroma and were small buds. I know you can't always do so, but inspect those hops before you buy. It's only natural that some years are not great growing years.

Sad thread. I just assumed I brewed a bad batch. My 2013 Amarillo definitely fits this description.

Thanks mm. From what you say, as well as others, the grassiness is noticeable just from smell the hops themselves. I guess I need to open my bag and transfer to foodsaver just to find out where mine stand. I suspect they'll be the same as most folks

I split a pound of Citra from HD with a friend and when we were splitting the pound I noticed a definite garlic (maybe onion) aroma in them (sulphur I suspect). Haven't used any in a batch yet but I'd be really bummed to have grassy amarillo and garlicy citra.

TyTanium said:

Sad thread. I just assumed I brewed a bad batch. My 2013 Amarillo definitely fits this description.

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Same here. I couldn't figure out what was off, this could be it.

Did anyone think last year's Chinook was grassy? I sure thought so. All the beers I made with Chinook didn't turn out so well and they smelled harsh/grassier than normal. Could just be me though...

I've had no issues with the whole chinook I got from HD last year (2012 crop). I picked up a lb of pellets from farmhouse mid-year but haven't opened those just yet.

stpug said:

Thanks mm. From what you say, as well as others, the grassiness is noticeable just from smell the hops themselves. I guess I need to open my bag and transfer to foodsaver just to find out where mine stand. I suspect they'll be the same as most folks

I split a pound of Citra from HD with a friend and when we were splitting the pound I noticed a definite garlic (maybe onion) aroma in them (sulphur I suspect). Haven't used any in a batch yet but I'd be really bummed to have grassy amarillo and garlicy citra.

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Anyone else have issues with 2013 Citra? I was about to pull the trigger on some, but I may hold off if it's not up to par.

Damn you all. This was my first year buying Amarillo, and I picked up 1# from Hop Heaven based on the rave reviews the varietal got last year.

I didn't detect anything grassy smelling when placing them into the jar to deep freeze, but I'm super bummed that I'll probably be disappointed with this year's harvest.

Can't wait to find out how my IPA turns out with a fwh of summit and 2013 Amarillo in just about every other step.

I recently made a single hop pale ale with Amarillo from Hops Direct, and I have to agree there was definitely a grassy aroma and taste, but after a week or so I am noticing the grassyness less and some orange flavors are coming thru. Overall, I'm still a bit disappointed with this years batch.

I'm still waiting for my simcarillo IPA to carbonate, so I'm not sure yet. But initial samples don't seem to be terrible, but maybe a little grassy. I did a blend of simcoe and amarillo, 2oz of each, mostly during the last 10 minutes of the boil. Then dry hopped with the same amount of each for a couple days in the keg. The hops are still in there but the keg is in the kegerator now at 38F. Find out soon...