IPA: Dry Hopping Secondary Fermentor

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ckovel

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I am making an IPA and I dry hopped the secondary fermentor 8 days ago. The thing is... the hops are still caking on the top of the beer. I've never dry hopped into the secondary before so i don't know if this is normal. Do i rack below this? Do I stir it in? Do I wait it out?
 
In the future just dry hop in the primary too. You can also siphon through a paint strainer bag to keep the floaty hops out. Or better yet, cold crash to get the hops to drop to the bottom.
 
Thanks. Can't cold crash. So I will stir in and strain out.

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From my experience, dry hopping during the last week of secondary fermentation, it helps to stir to get the most flavor out of your hops, but you will always have cones floating due to the residual CO2 in solution.
I made a hop strainer for my racking cane. It works perfectly.:D
 
In the future just dry hop in the primary too.

Sorry, I respectfully disagree. I'm totally against secondaries except for dry hopping. I get a much more pungent hop aroma when I dry hop in the secondary rather than the primary. Plus you can't harvest your yeast if you dry hop in the primary.
 
Sorry, I respectfully disagree. I'm totally against secondaries except for dry hopping. I get a much more pungent hop aroma when I dry hop in the secondary rather than the primary. Plus you can't harvest your yeast if you dry hop in the primary.

Why would dry hopping in secondary make any difference over primary?
If you wash the yeast couldn't you still harvest the yeast?
If you bag your hops couldn't you still harvest the yeast?
 
Why would dry hopping in secondary make any difference over primary?
If you wash the yeast couldn't you still harvest the yeast?
If you bag your hops couldn't you still harvest the yeast?

A. Hop oils tend to stick to yeast cells. Taste your yeast after you dry hop in the primary, it'll taste bitter and hoppy. That's hop oil that's not staying in your beer.
B. Yeast coated in hop oils aren't all that healthy, you really don't want to repitch yeast that was heavily dry hopped, and it doesn't wash that well.
C. It helps to some degree, but the same hop oils we want to diffuse into the beer will coat the hops.
 
I just dry hop in the secondary with whole hops. The hops float, but that's what they do. I give a swirl to get everything wet and let it sit for a day and swirl it again. After that I just use an Auto Siphon to rack to the keg. So far I haven't had any issues.

I never used a bag or anything because I didn't want to have to get it back out of my carboy. The hops rinse out just fine if I swirl the carboy to make a vortex when cleaning it out.

The pic is what it looks like before giving it a swirl (Black IPA). (I also purge the carboy with CO2 before swirling it to prevent oxidization).

dryhop.jpg
 
I just added 2oz. of dry hops to my primary and very carefully stirred them in. More so just pressed them down with a sanitized spoon to wet them. If carefully racking doesn't oxidize I highly doubt this would and I feel much better knowing all the hops are coated.

That being said, I'm curious what the best method for washing/harvesting my yeast would be. Should I put on sanitized gloves and pull some of the hops off the yeast cake before washing? Any tips would be appreciated.
 
Very green homebrewer here so forgive me if this is a silly/common question:

If dry hopping (pellets) in secondary (secondary is glass carboy, primary is plastic bucket with spigot), would it help to dump the hops in the dry carboy before racking, basically to minimize movement? Also would racking onto the hops in the secondary be enough to disperse the hops into the liquid without stirring?

Thanks in advance.
 
nelaina said:
Very green homebrewer here so forgive me if this is a silly/common question:

If dry hopping (pellets) in secondary (secondary is glass carboy, primary is plastic bucket with spigot), would it help to dump the hops in the dry carboy before racking, basically to minimize movement? Also would racking onto the hops in the secondary be enough to disperse the hops into the liquid without stirring?

Thanks in advance.

No question is silly and yes, put the hops in and rack the beer, perfectly fine!
 
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