Dry Hopping: When/How to transfer & bottle?

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Evan!

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So I made an IPA, my first attempt at a true IPA; it came from Papazian's "Palilalia" recipe, but slightly modified. Part of that modification was a dry-hop, which I've never done before.

So, my beer is sitting in secondary, dry hopping, in a 5-gal carboy. It's been in there with about an oz or so of wholeleaf Cascade, and some lime basil leaves. I don't want to over-dryhop it...so I'm thinking about bottling soon. It's been dryhopping for a week now...how long should I wait?

Also, when I do end up racking into the bottling bucket, is there anything special that I need to do? I'm afraid that the hops will clog the racking tube.

Thanks!
 
A week is good. Some kind of cloth wrapped around the inlet is your best bet. A grain bag would work.
 
I have put a hop bag (or anything like that, a piece of pantyhose would work) over my autosiphon's intake (or you could put it around the end of your plain siphon hose for that matter). From there into the keg or bottling bucket ought to work fine from you.
 
david_42 said:
A week is good. Some kind of cloth wrapped around the inlet is your best bet. A grain bag would work.

Cool...I have some grain socks I can use. What's a good way of attaching them to my racking cane?

As for the time issue, I've heard the 1-2-3 rule being brandied about regularly---1 week in primary, 2 weeks in secondary, 3 weeks in bottle. However, I did one week in primary, then when I transferred to secondary, I commenced dry-hopping immediately. So, it's been one week in secondary, and dry-hopping the whole time. Should I bottle now, or wait another week? Will 2 weeks of dryhopping do bad things, especially with the lime-basil leaves in there?
 
I just brewed that recipe, but my hop schedule was different (forgot to take the recipe with me) and I'm planning on dryhopping when I rack to my secondary. The one other time I dryhopped before, I just dumped the whole hops--no making hop tea or anything. Some people say the "tea" part kills what you want out of the hops, other people say you risk contamination if you don't...anyone want to give me some sage advice on this matter?

Also...what are the basil leaves for?

BREW ON:mug:
 
brackbrew said:
I just brewed that recipe, but my hop schedule was different (forgot to take the recipe with me) and I'm planning on dryhopping when I rack to my secondary. The one other time I dryhopped before, I just dumped the whole hops--no making hop tea or anything. Some people say the "tea" part kills what you want out of the hops, other people say you risk contamination if you don't...anyone want to give me some sage advice on this matter?

Also...what are the basil leaves for?

BREW ON:mug:

Hop "tea"? Isn't the idea of dry-hopping that you DON'T put the leaves hot liquid, and thus extract more subtle aromas and flavors through the slow extraction? Weird. Though, I gotta say: getting whole-leaf hops through a carboy neck really sucks. I ended up with a bunch on the basement floor.

The basil leaves are for flavor/aroma. I brewed a cinnamon basil pale ale last month, using cinnamon-basil (basilly-character w/ cinnamon overtones) and sweet italian basil. I didn't dry-hop that batch, I just dumped the basil leaves in at the end of the boil. The beer is amazing...we've gotten so many compliments (it gave one dude a boner, or so he claims) that we're planning on another batch.

This current batch, however, is different---since the lime-basil leaves have less of a basil character and more lime, it's an attempt at a lime IPA, really. It might turn out really weird, but hell, even the weird ones are fun. I boiled the leaves AND am dry-hopping with them. My hope is that it imparts the lime flavors and aromas, but not too much of that vegetable-stemmy character. We shall see. That's one reason I don't want to dryhop for too long.

Anyway, if anyone has an herb garden with basil growing, I urge you to use it in an ale---it really is a great adjunct, right up there with juniper berries.
 
Evan! said:
Anyway, if anyone has an herb garden with basil growing, I urge you to use it in an ale---it really is a great adjunct, right up there with juniper berries.

Wow! never thought of that. I've got way too much basic growing to eat. Hmmm, might have to give this a try.
 
I have tried the pantyhose over the siphon before and it just got clogged so what i do is take the middle piece of my wine thief, place it over the nozzle end of my strainer/funnel and siphon through that into the bottling bucket. this way there is no need to fiddle with panty hose or other that might get clogged. sure i know there's prob a couple 100 ppl out there that have never had it clog, but with some of the highly hopped beers that i brew, it has been a problem. using my strainer/funner worked like a charm.
 
Evan!

I couldn't get into the Subscribed Threads screen, but that's not why I'm posting.

How much basil did you use in that cinnamon basil pale ale? How long did you boil it? 0 minutes? 5 minutes? 10 minutes?

My wife wants me to try some "odd" adjuncts. I tried rosemary. Let me tell you, there is a reason why you can't find a commercial beer with rosemary in it. bleh.
 
gruntingfrog said:
Evan!

I couldn't get into the Subscribed Threads screen, but that's not why I'm posting.

How much basil did you use in that cinnamon basil pale ale? How long did you boil it? 0 minutes? 5 minutes? 10 minutes?

My wife wants me to try some "odd" adjuncts. I tried rosemary. Let me tell you, there is a reason why you can't find a commercial beer with rosemary in it. bleh.

I wish I could give you a specific measurement as to how much basil I used, but I kinda winged it. I would say, loosely packed into a 4-qt pyrex dish, it came halfway up.

As for when, well, we added it when we added the flavor/aroma hops, so, roughly 2 minutes in the boil, then left them in until it cooled and we sparged.

Yeah, I've always wondered about rosemary...thought it might give off a little bit of that sprucey/juniper thing...good to know that it's bleh. Good luck with the basil---FYI, honey is fun to use in basil ales. I haven't done it myself, but Bison Brewing does a great Honey Basil ale. :mug:
 
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