My house smells like hops!

So I'm brewing my Blind Pig IPA and my wife goes "Our house smells like hops!" This is my first brew ever. Ill post pics later. Wish me luck!

Best smell ever!

Be careful not all wives like the smell of hops comming from the kitchen. That is why I brew outdoors.

Crazy how more potent in smell the pellets are compared to the hole flower. I love my wife she supports everything I do. And she drinks beer!

My wife hates it and I brew outside now but my garage always smells fantastic

So I pitched my yeast about an hour ago and it's OG was at exactly 1.060. The recipes OG ranges were 1.060 -1.065. I used White Labs American ale yeast WLP001.

During the hop additions I sampled some of the hop pellets. Wow are they tastey and super biter!

I will post pics tonight.

Hope your first brew went well! Welcome to the insanity

consider yourself luck if your wife actually likes the smell of hops.. Many women dont.. Thankfully my wife loves it.. I had a job for a summer many years ago as a hop inspection supervisor.. Essentially I drove to all the commercial hop farms in the Yakima Valley and took core samples of their hop shipments to test for moisture, AAU, Betas, and amount of seeds.. I had to transport all the samples in my car.. Which smelled like hops for the next four years.. Not even kidding.. That's how potent the smell was.. So I was very fortunate that my wife likes it since she had to drive that car everyday...

Nummy!

Thanks Groosbrews! She doesn't mind the smell. I can't wait to try it. Also if anyone wants a sample let me know. I'm willing to give some away to have others judge it for me. To remind you all, I don't drink.

Oh man I just wrote out this reply on my phone with pictures and everything and all of a sudden " Boom!" my phone freezes. UGH, unfortunately I had to turn my phone off. So instead of doing it all over again on my phone, I decided to just use the computer. Here goes,

Steeping the Specialty grains at 170* for 30 mins
.5lbs. Carapils
.5lbs. Crystal 40L


Added 1lb. Bavarian Wheat DME
9lbs. Ultralight LME and first hop addition.
2oz. Chinook Hops 60 min boil (Bittering hops)


Second hop addition.
.5oz. Cascade Hops 30 min boil (Flavoring hops)


Last hop addition.
1oz. Cascade Hops Last 15 mins in boil (Aroma hops)


Yeast Pitched!


I took my OG reading and it was at 1.060. I used White Labs American Ale Yeast WLP001. I also used a Whirfloc tablet in the last 20 mins of the boil. Fun times, first brew.

May your first brew be a raging winner and your home smell for ever more of hops!

Haha, Cheers!

So fermentation has started and I'm already sniffing the airlock! Look at that Krausen!

Wow, looks great. Congrats, you're making BEER!

Thanks gcdowd!

I'm thinking of setting a few beers aside to have them judged by fellow HBT members. I have a few ideas jumping around in my head. Can you ship homebrews to friends?

Lol fermentation is really healthy! My airlock was getting clogged up from the krausen so I had to switch to a hose. I'm glad I'm excited enough to check the thing every few mins, otherwise I'm sure I would have had a nice mess.

unionrdr said:

I use UPS,double bag Well padded. I declare them as "liquid yeast samples".

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So when you drop the package off, you just tell them liquid yeast samples? Or do you not say anything if they don't ask?

I just don't want to get into any trouble. Not sure what the laws are.

Happy belated brew day! I spent a few hours yesterday brewing a gingerbread brown ale, which is happily bubbling away in my ale pail in our home office's comfortable 66 degrees.

Here's to brewing great beer!

metanoia said:

Happy belated brew day! I spent a few hours yesterday brewing a gingerbread brown ale, which is happily bubbling away in my ale pail in our home office's comfortable 66 degrees.

Here's to brewing great beer!

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Thanks! Happy belated brew day to you as well! Cheers!

evolcoms said:

Crazy how more potent in smell the pellets are compared to the hole flower. I love my wife she supports everything I do. And she drinks beer!

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Depends where your getting them from, some fresh hops are way more pungent. But here in Oregon i think we're lucky in that the brew shops get fresh hops direct from the growers only a week or two after harvest...

To tell you the truth, I've only smelt fresh hops once. They must have been weak in aroma cause the pellets were strong.

evolcoms said:

Crazy how more potent in smell the pellets are compared to the hole flower. I love my wife she supports everything I do. And she drinks beer!

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Your lucky, mine hates beer that is not sweet and tastes like a candy bar. Just stay stupid woman.

evolcoms said:

To tell you the truth, I've only smelt fresh hops once. They must have been weak in aroma cause the pellets were strong.

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I think every home brewer should take a trip to the Sam Adams brewery in Boston during their lifetime, it's like the mecca for home brewers. During the tour they pass around cups of different grains and hops, encouraging guests to taste the grains as well as rub the hop leafs in their hands to get some great aromas. Mmmm, hops.

metanoia said:

I think every home brewer should take a trip to the Sam Adams brewery in Boston during their lifetime, it's like the mecca for home brewers. During the tour they pass around cups of different grains and hops, encouraging guests to taste the grains as well as rub the hop leafs in their hands to get some great aromas. Mmmm, hops.

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That sounds fun. Hmmmm, I think a trip next year might work. I would like to take a tour of Sam adams brewery (my name is Sam).

evolcoms said:

That sounds fun. Hmmmm, I think a trip next year might work. I would like to take a tour of Sam adams brewery (my name is Sam).

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There ya go! It's a total blast, we take a visit there about once a year when we travel out to visit my parents back home. 10 minutes listening about ingredients, 10 minutes listening about the brewing process, then half an hour of drinking 3-4 samples of brews. That's about 2-3 free bottles-worth of Sam Adams depending on how close you are to the pitchers of beer once everyone has their tasting glass full! Plus you can pick up one of their signature pint glasses for free at a local restaurant when you order a pint.

learning the different flavors and aromas of different hops, grains, yeasts, etc has been one of the best parts of this new hobby of mine. It makes trying a new beer more enjoyable when you can pick out different flavors you know from experience. I'm lucky to work at a beer distributor and get to try lots of different beers regularly, and it has made a huge difference on how I taste beers.

Warning: this will quickly annoy your non homebrewing/beer-geek friends when you ramble on about the scent of certain hops, and the undertones of brett that will no doubt become more prevalent with some more age..... When you see that glazed over look in their eyes, it may be time to back it off a bit

Fermentation update:

After the first day of ACTIVE fermentation, I noticed my temps where between (72-74). I was aiming the high 60's. So I added a nice damp t shirt and put the carboy in container filled with ice water. The temps dropped to 66-68 with the changes. Now all I have to do is wait a few more days and transfer to my secondary for dry hopping!

Forgot to add a pic.

The instructions say transfer to secondary after 7 days. Does that sound right?

evolcoms said:

The instructions say transfer to secondary after 7 days. Does that sound right?

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Ignore the instructions. If you haven't already, pick up How to Brew or The Complete Joy of Homebrewing. They'll give you much better and detailed instructions in the brew process.

Basically, take a SG reading, perhaps after 7 days. If it's near the FG, take a new reading every two days. When those SG readings level out and are the same across two days, fermentation is done and you're okay to rack to a secondary (mostly for dry hops and extra clearing), or bottle (I'd cold crash for a day or two).

Ok, so transfer to secondary once FG is reached? What's cold crashing?

Edit: Researched " Cold Crashing ".Figured it out. Thx

I took a gravity reading today after 8 days in the primary and I'm looking around 1.023. I'm still getting airlock activity every 15 secs. I'm going to leave it for another 4 days before I take another reading. I want the abv to be 6.0 so for that I need a fg of 1.014. We shall see!

Should I use a hop bag for dry hopping if the hops are in pellet form?

Everyone will have a different opinion on the matter, in addition to the debate between leaf and pellets for dry hopping.

I think the general consensus is that if you don't use a hop bag for pellets, then put a hop bag or cheesecloth-like material over your racking cane when siphoning off to the bottling bucket.