Dry Hopping

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JTMavs

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Could someone explain this technique to me? What are you hoping to accomplish by doing it? When do you add if only bottling and not kegging? I have a Milk Stout in the secondary and a Wiezenbier in the primary currently. Really wanting to learn some of the finer techniques as I advance in the hobby of home brewing!
 
Dry hopping is meant, as far as I understand it, to improve primarily the hops aroma in a beer. It may slightly impact flavor but I don't know for sure. It is typically done with hop-heavy beers like IPAs. I'm sure you can dry hop anything you want to see the effects. Basically, you toss some hops into the beer before bottling/kegging. I plan to dry hop a Citra IPA for 5 days, then cold crash from day 5 to day 7 then keg. I'll dry hop with one ounce of cascade whole leaf hops.

Heck, I talked to a guy at my last club meet who "dry peppered" his jalapeno saison. Was an interesting, but appropriate, use of the term for sure.
 
Dry hoping is to freshen and reinforce the hops profile from the end of the boil and to add another layer of hop flavor and aroma. But, historically it was to preserve the beer on the voyage from england to india.

Beat me to it!
 
Generally dry hopping is used to add a final dose of hops aroma to your beer. It does impart a small amount of flavor as well. The aroma helps enforce the flavor of your flavoring hops. Remember from school that part of how we perceive tastes are actually affected by smell.

Typically dry hopping is done for 5-10 days in secondary, however some people dry hop in primary. Others do it in the keg, but they would need to chime in as I am not sure how that works.
 
I am sure I am not doing something right because every time I attempt to dry hop.... well.... they always come out sopping wet. :drunk:
 
Would you suggest a dry hop with either the milk stout or wiezenbier? I'm adding some chocolate flavoring to the stout so I don't know if "more" hoppy is what I would prefer. Thanks for your replies!
 
Would you suggest a dry hop with either the milk stout or wiezenbier? I'm adding some chocolate flavoring to the stout so I don't know if "more" hoppy is what I would prefer. Thanks for your replies!

Don't dry hop the stout. The weizenbier, I'm 50/50 on that. It wouldn't be traditional and it will cover up most of the yeast flavor which, IMO is the focus of that style.
 
JTMavs said:
Would you suggest a dry hop with either the milk stout or wiezenbier? I'm adding some chocolate flavoring to the stout so I don't know if "more" hoppy is what I would prefer. Thanks for your replies!

This doesn't enforce the bitterness most people associate with hoppy beers. It enforces the complex flavors and aromas hops can provide. I would probably skip it on the stout. You can search for weizenbier recipes to see if there are any out there that include dry hopping.
 
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