Belma Hops

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I just bottled my single-hopped Belma pale ale. In addition to the 60 minute bittering hops, I did additions at 30, 15, 5, and flameout to get the full range of flavors this variety has to offer (didn't do a dry-hop because my buddy dry-hopped his and I can see how that's gonna work out when we swap some brews).

So, impressions at bottling time? Wow. The fruity aroma and flavor is amazing. When I took the lid off the fermenter, it smelled like I dry-hopped with a strawberry fruit roll-up. Strawberry and passion fruit comes through in the flavor as well, and a nice, smooth bitterness compliments the fruity notes. Like no beer I've ever had before, for sure. I think this is going to be really interesting (in a good way) once it carbs and conditions. The Belma seems like it should be a good late-addition hop for summery beers and saisons. I may also use it in the future for bittering because it seems quite smooth for a high AA hop.

I'll post most impressions after it's carbed and ready to drink.

Other Belma experimenters- keep posting tasting notes! I'm interested to see what other folks did and how it turned out!
 
I just cracked opened my bag of Belma tonight and weighed out an addition for an IPA I'll be brewing tomorrow. There are so many mixed reviews on this hop, so I am only adding a 20 minute addition to my brew. However, I will be splitting the 10 gallon batch into two 5 gallon batches, and I think I will dry hop one exclusively with Belma.

FWIW, I am using Bravo for bittering, Columbus, Citra and Belma for flavor additions.

On a side note, I was slightly disappointed at the amount of lumber in my Belma leafs. The Citra was super clean no sticks, stems, and vines. On the other hand the Belma was full of that stuff. Both came from Hops Direct, so...:confused:

Will post results in a few weeks.
 
Schnitzengiggle said:
On a side note, I was slightly disappointed at the amount of lumber in my Belma leafs. The Citra was super clean no sticks, stems, and vines. On the other hand the Belma was full of that stuff. Both came from Hops Direct, so...:confused:

Same here -- a lot of browning on the cones, and a lot of big twigs and stems. I guess they're not making much on this hop at these prices, though.
 
It smells great, I will be kegging this weekend and will post results

I never heard of these hops until today, so I read this whole thread. You said you brewed a Zombie Dust clone. How did it turn out?

I have brewed Zombie Dust three times now.
First, I used all-Citra.
Second, I used Amarillo/Citra
Third, I used Amarillo/Citra/Simcoe (keeps getting better)

I think the Zombie malt bill is excellent, and I am going to keep playing with it. Most recipes call for an English yeast. For my next clone, I am going back to all-Citra, but I am going to use US-05.

I think I would like to try brewing this with these Belma hops. They are still one pound for $5.25. They sound good.
 
Same here -- a lot of browning on the cones, and a lot of big twigs and stems. I guess they're not making much on this hop at these prices, though.

Hops Direct is the grower of Belma (that's how they sell it so cheaply) while the Citra comes from a different source. IIRC Citra is only grown at a few select farms. That would explain difference in stem content.
 
So, impressions at bottling time? Wow. The fruity aroma and flavor is amazing. When I took the lid off the fermenter, it smelled like I dry-hopped with a strawberry fruit roll-up.

Thanks for this - Strawberry Fruit Roll Up is an excellent descriptor. I also came up with "Strawberry flavor Bubblicious bubble gum" when I was drinking my Velma Smash last night. It's a very sweet and pleasant red berry scent.
 
I have a feeling with all these comments that Belma could end up my go-to hop for blonde/kolsch/cream ales. A simple grain bill with Belma at 60 minutes and 5 minutes sounds pretty delicious.
 
I was just thinking a cream ale with a small bittering addition and a little Belma at 20 and flameout would be really good.
 
I just cracked opened my bag of Belma tonight and weighed out an addition for an IPA I'll be brewing tomorrow. There are so many mixed reviews on this hop, so I am only adding a 20 minute addition to my brew. However, I will be splitting the 10 gallon batch into two 5 gallon batches, and I think I will dry hop one exclusively with Belma.

FWIW, I am using Bravo for bittering, Columbus, Citra and Belma for flavor additions.

On a side note, I was slightly disappointed at the amount of lumber in my Belma leafs. The Citra was super clean no sticks, stems, and vines. On the other hand the Belma was full of that stuff. Both came from Hops Direct, so...:confused:

Will post results in a few weeks.

The Citra was sold by Hops Direct, but wasn't grown there. Probably a bale bought from another farm that grows Citra, and they made them into pellets, or simply resold it from another farm.

Belma, however, was grown, and processed there, hence the extra "junk".
 
I am glad for all the feed back so far. I too jumped in with both feet at the low price and got 5lbs. I was planning on trying a single hop IPA but have now been convinced to blend with some C's (not my amarillo), I usually do a light Ame. cream that I will try it with.
 
Since everyone has been posting aroma notes, I thought I would post mine. Equal additions of belma, citra and cascade and it smelled like Hawaiian Punch when I opened the fermenter. Good stuff.
 
Since I wasn't too happy with Belma in a very hop-forward pale/IPA beer, I'm now cooling my next attempt: Belma in a nice dark, malt-bomb porter. Just a bittering addition and a 10 minute flavor addition for around 25 IBUs, with an OG around 1.070. I might secondary with some fruit or vanilla, depending how it tastes.

Edit: oops, make that 1.060. Missed my numbers pretty good there!
 
Got my Belmapocalypse keg'd today. First taste is super mild... almost BMC-ish, except for the (rather mild) hops notes... really clean up front. Very little aroma. Not too good of a bittering hop IMHO.
Floral, slight citrus, earthy after taste.
I will do a much stronger late addition next time (maybe dry hop), and probably bitter with Centennial instead.
 
Gave away the last remaining bottles of my Belgian Belma Berry Blaster to family for Christmas and was nearly forced to take money to brew another batch.

I've got a zombie dust clone in my fermenters ready to bottle tomorrow and a NZ hop bomb pale on deck after that. Looks like another Belgian Belma is a must brew after those...
 
Got my Belmapocalypse keg'd today. First taste is super mild... almost BMC-ish, except for the (rather mild) hops notes... really clean up front. Very little aroma. Not too good of a bittering hop IMHO.
Floral, slight citrus, earthy after taste.
I will do a much stronger late addition next time (maybe dry hop), and probably bitter with Centennial instead.


What makes you not like it as a bittering hop? Has a nice high AA, and it's a nice fruity bittering hop. If the hop fails at everything in terms of flavor and aroma for folks, I think it really is as a fail safe, a great, cheap bittering hop.
 
Here's my first Belma recipe (brewed it today):

12 lbs Pale Malt, Maris Otter, Warminster (4.5 SRM) 90.6 %
16.0 oz Acid Malt (3.0 SRM) 7.5 % (added 30 min into a 50 min mash)
4.0 oz White Wheat Malt (2.4 SRM) 1.9 %
0.25 oz Belma [11.30 %] - First Wort 60.0 min 9.5 IBUs
1.00 Items Whirlfloc Tablet (Boil 15.0 mins) -
0.50 tsp Yeast Nutrient (Boil 15.0 mins) -
1.00 oz Belma [11.30 %] - Boil 10.0 min 12.6 IBUs
1.75 oz Belma [11.30 %] - Boil 1.0 min 2.6 IBUs
1.0 pkg Brettanomyces Lambucus (Wyeast Labs #5526) [50.28 ml] -
1.0 pkg French Saison (Wyeast Labs #3711) [50.28 ml] (starter made with both yeasts mixed together)

The O.G was 1.063 (~5.7 gallons), and I pitched the two yeasts at 65 F. Looking forward to drinking this sucker in a few months! The wort actually had a nice little acidic tang to it.
I did a similar saison-brett last year with 3711/Brett B that finished @ 1.002, so this bad boy could end up being 8% ABV when all is said and done.
 
Here's my first Belma recipe (brewed it today):

12 lbs Pale Malt, Maris Otter, Warminster (4.5 SRM) 90.6 %
16.0 oz Acid Malt (3.0 SRM) 7.5 % (added 30 min into a 50 min mash)
4.0 oz White Wheat Malt (2.4 SRM) 1.9 %
0.25 oz Belma [11.30 %] - First Wort 60.0 min 9.5 IBUs
1.00 Items Whirlfloc Tablet (Boil 15.0 mins) -
0.50 tsp Yeast Nutrient (Boil 15.0 mins) -
1.00 oz Belma [11.30 %] - Boil 10.0 min 12.6 IBUs
1.75 oz Belma [11.30 %] - Boil 1.0 min 2.6 IBUs
1.0 pkg Brettanomyces Lambucus (Wyeast Labs #5526) [50.28 ml] -
1.0 pkg French Saison (Wyeast Labs #3711) [50.28 ml] (starter made with both yeasts mixed together)

The O.G was 1.063 (~5.7 gallons), and I pitched the two yeasts at 65 F. Looking forward to drinking this sucker in a few months! The wort actually had a nice little acidic tang to it.
I did a similar saison-brett last year with 3711/Brett B that finished @ 1.002, so this bad boy could end up being 8% ABV when all is said and done.

Cool! One of the more interesting recipes in the thread so far. Post again as it evolves. I'm getting into discovering the flavors created by the combination of yeasts and hop compounds. With the hundreds of chemicals in hops and the unknown metabolic processes of different yeast strains there is a lot of trippy potential. :drunk:
 
Here's my first Belma recipe (brewed it today):

12 lbs Pale Malt, Maris Otter, Warminster (4.5 SRM) 90.6 %
16.0 oz Acid Malt (3.0 SRM) 7.5 % (added 30 min into a 50 min mash)
4.0 oz White Wheat Malt (2.4 SRM) 1.9 %
0.25 oz Belma [11.30 %] - First Wort 60.0 min 9.5 IBUs
1.00 Items Whirlfloc Tablet (Boil 15.0 mins) -
0.50 tsp Yeast Nutrient (Boil 15.0 mins) -
1.00 oz Belma [11.30 %] - Boil 10.0 min 12.6 IBUs
1.75 oz Belma [11.30 %] - Boil 1.0 min 2.6 IBUs
1.0 pkg Brettanomyces Lambucus (Wyeast Labs #5526) [50.28 ml] -
1.0 pkg French Saison (Wyeast Labs #3711) [50.28 ml] (starter made with both yeasts mixed together)

The O.G was 1.063 (~5.7 gallons), and I pitched the two yeasts at 65 F. Looking forward to drinking this sucker in a few months! The wort actually had a nice little acidic tang to it.
I did a similar saison-brett last year with 3711/Brett B that finished @ 1.002, so this bad boy could end up being 8% ABV when all is said and done.

That sounds tasty. Can I ask what temperature you mash at?
 
That sounds tasty. Can I ask what temperature you mash at?

I mashed at 152 F, but it was cold out, and when I added the acid malt and gave the tun a stir, the temp reading was down to ~142, so I heated the tun back up to 152 and let it sit another 10 minutes. Everything ran clear, so it looked good. There's no way I could've mashed at a lower temp very easily when it was around 20 F in my garage, lol.
 
Here's my first Belma recipe (brewed it today):

12 lbs Pale Malt, Maris Otter, Warminster (4.5 SRM) 90.6 %
16.0 oz Acid Malt (3.0 SRM) 7.5 % (added 30 min into a 50 min mash)
4.0 oz White Wheat Malt (2.4 SRM) 1.9 %
0.25 oz Belma [11.30 %] - First Wort 60.0 min 9.5 IBUs
1.00 Items Whirlfloc Tablet (Boil 15.0 mins) -
0.50 tsp Yeast Nutrient (Boil 15.0 mins) -
1.00 oz Belma [11.30 %] - Boil 10.0 min 12.6 IBUs
1.75 oz Belma [11.30 %] - Boil 1.0 min 2.6 IBUs
1.0 pkg Brettanomyces Lambucus (Wyeast Labs #5526) [50.28 ml] -
1.0 pkg French Saison (Wyeast Labs #3711) [50.28 ml] (starter made with both yeasts mixed together)

The O.G was 1.063 (~5.7 gallons), and I pitched the two yeasts at 65 F. Looking forward to drinking this sucker in a few months! The wort actually had a nice little acidic tang to it.
I did a similar saison-brett last year with 3711/Brett B that finished @ 1.002, so this bad boy could end up being 8% ABV when all is said and done.

I did a something similar last week. Lower gravity, less Acid malt, and 1.5lbs of Munich. Also a little Citra in there as well, and no brett.

Ok, it's nothing similar to that =). I'll try that again. I also brewed a Saison with Belma. There. That's better.
 
Put in the dry hops for my 2-row Belma SMaSH today and also took a gravity sample. Obviously I'll have to wait for the final beer to give my assessment, but for now the aroma I get is strong pineapple and strawberry. The flavor is also fruity, but with less discernible difference between the individual flavors. Unfortunately I had a brain fart and in the interest of trying a new hop schedule, I did all late hops and no bittering charge, so I don't have an idea of how it performs as a bittering hop. It's yet to be certain, but I don't think I'd use this as a bittering hop anyway, so hopefully it's a moot point.
 
There are better bittering hops, but none cheaper. With Belma being confirmed by many of us as a "mild" strength hop without any harsh flavor characteristics, its safe to assume Belma in fact is a great candidate for bittering and aroma/flavor.
 
So.. what do you guys think.. worth $16/LB after shipping?


Ehh. No. I'll be honest, it's not. It's a flavorful, great dual purpose hop. Buying hops in bulk is only really worth it if you buy more, and it cuts down on the shipping and you have the ability to store it.
 
AnOldUR said:
You bought one pound of Belma and nothing else?

Buy in bulk. You're doing it wrong. :cross:

I'm primarily a one gallon brewer... So thats more like 5 lb of hops. I use Palisades a lot, maybe I could also order a pound of them if hopsdirect have them in stock along with belma


Thanks for feedback I'll pass on Belma
 
I went in with 3 other guys from the local brew club for a total of 9 pounds. That made shipping $13.50, which is a HUGE difference.
 
I drank one of my Belma Belgian "IPA's" tonight after almost three weeks in the bottle. I added two ounces of Belma and one ounce of Citra at flame out and then dry hopped the same. Wyeast Belgian Ardennes 3522 yeast. This beer tastes like tropical fruit punch. I actually really like it, it's refreshing and different then my other beers which are mainly American IPAs or Barleywines. SWMBO doesn't like it but she doesn't like Belgian yeasts.
 
Oh man, my Belmapocalypse is still a little green, but this is really turning out freak'n delicious!
 
acidrain said:
Oh man, my Belmapocalypse is still a little green, but this is really turning out freak'n delicious!

Did you post this recipe? I didn't see it and I am always interested in delicious. Got 2 pounds of Belma to use.
 
I really hop these turn out well, if not belma will turn into a really cheap bittering hop for me. Hope to brew with them in a week or so myself. Either way 5 bucks for 20 oz of a nice bittering hop is a win any way you look at it
 
i have been drinking my belma pale ale for last 2 weeks and love another homebrew buddy who has been brewing since 1983 also has tried and liked it so much he immediately ordered some. smooth flavor with a very nice berry flavor
 
i have been drinking my belma pale ale for last 2 weeks and love another homebrew buddy who has been brewing since 1983 also has tried and liked it so much he immediately ordered some. smooth flavor with a very nice berry flavor

this post here is the reason that punctuation is really important!!!

Glad your beer turned out well
 
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