Summit - Avoiding The Onion

I brew extremely good APAs/IPAs using a Simcoe/Mosaic, Amarillo, Citra combo. I'm now trying to come up with as similar a beer as possible to be brewed at a much larger scale and frequency using more readily available and cheaper hops. Cascade and a few others hops came to mind...one being summit. But it seems everyone's experiences with this hop are extremely inconsistent ranging from tangerine-onion. So I'm wondering if anyone has any input on how to get the citrus and avoid the onion.

If your just going to tell me there's nothing I can do to replicate that hop combo just save your time and don't post. There may be no exact match but I know I can find a combo close enough for what I'm after. Thanks in advance.

Summit is a great hop. The onion note is sort of there, but I get more of an earthy/danky/citrus thing myself. Some say tangerine and I can agree with that too. It's great and cheap!

Don't forget centennial and my new cheap late hop, chinook. Chinook has a surprisingly complex fruitiness when used in quantity toward the end of the boil and as a dry hop... It's not just pungency and pine.

...pile on those pricy boutique hops and everything tastes great!

bigbeergeek said:

Summit is a great hop. The onion note is sort of there, but I get more of an earthy/danky/citrus thing myself. Some say tangerine and I can agree with that too. It's great and cheap!

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bigbeergeek said:

Don't forget centennial and my new cheap late hop, chinook. Chinook has a surprisingly complex fruitiness when used in quantity toward the end of the boil and as a dry hop... It's not just pungency and pine.

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That's exactly why I thought it might work as a decent Simcoe sub. I want the earthy/dank/citrus thing. But since I'll be hop bursting I was afraid of getting an onion bomb.
Chinook/Cascade/Summit was actually one of the hop combos I was considering. Thoughts on that?

Go for it, cascade is cheap. I find it to be more flowery than citrus so I can't seem to find a place for it (can't seem to finish up the last pound of em in my freezer). How about centennial? They're cheap and better than cascades for your purposes, I think. http://www.fiftypoundsack.com/products/Centennial-Pellets.html

In my last ipa I used hop pellets. I forgot the brand but the name of them were magnum. Turned out awesome with lots of floral and citrus notes. I used some brown sugar also. Very different and every one loved the 8.5 ipa

bigbeergeek said:

Go for it, cascade is cheap. I find it to be more flowery than citrus so I can't seem to find a place for it (can't seem to finish up the last pound of em in my freezer). How about centennial? They're cheap and better than cascades for your purposes, I think. http://www.fiftypoundsack.com/products/Centennial-Pellets.html

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I've considered centennial because I really like the hop. The only thing that's had me iffy about them is they seem to be one of those that disappear during hop shortages. I won't say they're off the table though I'm just looking at all my options.

hennesey1 said:

In my last ipa I used hop pellets. I forgot the brand but the name of them were magnum. Turned out awesome with lots of floral and citrus notes. I used some brown sugar also. Very different and every one loved the 8.5 ipa

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I thought about magnum but I've never used it for anything other than bittering. I also don't want the beer to be too much like SNPA and if I used cascade and magnum that's 2/3 of the hops used for that beer.

Magnum late should give you more of a dank, dirty flavor.

I've been mixing more and more willamette in with mine lately to add the dank, dirty flavor and it pairs well with fruity hops.

I think I remember reading on here that the onion level was due to the hop being picked too late in the season. So I would assume that the level of onion would vary by year and grower. I have used Summit before and didn't get any onion and thought the hop was great.

jww9618 said:

I think I remember reading on here that the onion level was due to the hop being picked too late in the season. So I would assume that the level of onion would vary by year and grower. I have used Summit before and didn't get any onion and thought the hop was great.

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The inconsistency just worries me. The positive reviews are great and enticing but the negative ones make me iffy. The recipe will be used at a friends brewery for his house pale ale so consistency is pretty crucial. I was kinda hoping to hear the onion thing wouldn't be an issue if used late in the boil but so far no one has really specified that.

Guess we'll see.... still looking for as much feedback as possible on this.

I would give them a shot. I think a lot of growers understand that the hop needs to be picked earlier in harvest. I think it's the same thing with Simcoe and cat piss.

I got a real strong cat pee from Summit...same with I was able to make a couple of decent beers with it by limiting the hop to first bittering and using other hops later in the recipe, but I ended up giving almost a half pound of them away because I could not fully shake that flavor.

I won't be trying Summit again, but I'm glad other people like them and are able to use them successfully!