tons of dry hopping... no aroma

Hi there, my last two batches have been Rye IIPAs. First batch tasted just about perfect but after 5oz of dry hops (5gal batch) I had little to no aroma after kegging. This latest batch was a repeat but I added 1.5oz more hops at flame out and an additional 2oz as a third addition of dry hops. Aroma is just about the same... I don't get it. What might I be doing wrong?

I've had regular IPAs that have smelled amazing with far less hops.

Please list your Rye IIPA recipe, stats, and processes in detail.

You are using enough hops to dryhop Pliny the Younger, so the hops may either be very old, or there is something very wrong with your processes that is causing the reduced aroma.

Dry hop in beer that is clear of yeast and also be sure to dry hop at 60 degrees or greater. I have found that after 2-3 days the dry hops have done there job....start drinking the beer asap. I like dry hops in the kegs as well.

Need more info about your process and your ingredients. How long are you dry hopping for? How long before you drink after dry hopping?

10 Gallon Batch (we split it in two so we each had a 5 gal batch). RO water with 10gm of gypsum and 1gm of CaCl added.

18lbs of 2Row
4.5lbs of Munich
1lb of C40
1lb Carapils
3lb of Rye

Mash at 152 for 90 mins.

Two cooler method, fly sparge. Sparge water at 180, 30 min sparge. Runnings at
gravity of 12 when we stopped sparging. Sparge water did not have gypsum or CaCl
added.

Boil hops:
2oz Apollo @ first wort
2oz simcoe @ 30
2oz Columbus @ 20
3oz Centenniel @ 10
3oz Columbus @ 5
3oz Simcoe @ Flameout
2oz Cascade @ Flameout

Dry hops:
2oz Centenniel @ day 7
1oz of Cascade @ Day 7
2oz of Nelson @ Day 10
2Oz of Simcoe @ day 14

1600ml White Labs Cal ale yeast starter, pitched after 24 hours in the beaker.

Ferm temp at 67-68deg for 99% of the time, but peaked at 71deg for a few hours when yeast went nuts. Blow off used
but replaced with an airlock after 7 days.

Kegged on day 21. Tasted amazing and had good aroma. (I filtered with 1micron filter from keg one to two… I did notice lines were backwards, going from keg out to filter out,etc… but I was already 10 mins into filtration so I left it) both were first cleaned with PBW (sat for 30 mins at about 140deg… ran from keg one to two thru lines) then rinsed 4 times with tap water, then filled with sanitizer for 30 minutes (15 mins per side). About 1 gallon PBW, 1 gal tap and 1 gal san run through all lines.

Day 26 I tried it after force carbing at 30 for 1 day, then 20 for 2, then 15 until last night. Very light aroma but flavor was spot on. Super mild medicinal smell has me a little worried. The only thing I can attribute this to is filling the better bottles with hose water to dilute the sanitizer. Maybe a little stuck around?

Today is day 27.

Are you dry hopping with pellets? Is that why you are filtering? As an aside, you might add lactic acid to your sparge water to help keep it acidic.

That's a big beer. Looks like you may have dry hopped before the yeast had finished. In which case most of the aroma could have been lost. Did you dry hop in the primary? Did you take a gravity reading before dry hopping?

When I dryhop in the primary, I put the dryhops in after 3 weeks of fermentation and conditioning of flavors. Then, I wait another 7-14 days and have exactly what I'm looking for.

If you dryhop during primary fermentation then the CO2 purges most of the aromas out of the airlock and gives you a weak overall aroma. When you implement a staggered dryhop, the intention is to remove the used dryhops and add fresh ones with each addition. This can be difficult to do for many homebrewers without oxygenating the beer. So you may have oxygenated your beer by continually opening and closing the airlock and shaking the carboy.

All pellets.

I fear you are right. It was not done fully fermenting out but the airlock had been pretty dead for a few days. I know that's not a good gauge.

Will dry hopping in the keg at 40deg help get me back some aroma?

Not so much at 40 degrees.


Time to build that Randall?

So... bringing the keg up to 60deg for a few days and dry hop with a little Nelson will help?

That would be my choice. Some here say that they leave hops in the keg for the entire time they serve. Tried that once with bad (turned grassy after a couple of weeks) results and will never do it again. So, yes to 60 degrees (better yet 70) and yes to "a few days" up to a week before removing and chilling.

I use whole hops to dry hop and get great hop aroma in my beer. From personal experience the whole hops add more fresh hop aroma than the pellets, but I know plenty of people successfully dry hop with pellets. I would personally skip the filtering process as well, as some haze in an IPA is perfectly acceptable, and the filtering could be taking a little something away from your aroma as well.

A couple of things to think about that may be a factor in losing the hoppiness.

A 1 micron filter will strip out quite a bit of flavor from the beer. Not just polyphenols and tannins and yeast, but some of the hops flavor and compounds as well. That could be one cause.

Another cause is "burst carbing" the beer in the keg, especially if you're purging after each reduction in the regulator settings. Each purge allows the aromatics from the hops to blow off.

Yooper, very interesting about purging the aromatics. I never thought about that. It may certainly change the way I keg my IPAs!

I have read conflicting reports about the 1 micron filter, but I may play that safe next time too and see if there is an effect.

Looks like I'm going to move on to RyeIIPA number 3 soon!

opinions on the hose water?

Yeah don't use it unless its one of those RV hoses that is made for drinking water.

Is it a good idea to bring the keg back up to room temp (60-65 deg)when adding another dry hop edition? Does dry hopping at 40 degrees kill any chance of getting significant aroma? Will bringing the keg to room temp for 2-3 days in order to get more aroma cause any ill effects?

anyone... I want to do this tonight if possible

erockomania said:

anyone... I want to do this tonight if possible

Click to expand...

It takes longer for dryhopping at fridge temps, but I dryhop in the keg at fridge temps all the time. I never had any "grassy" flavors or any problems with doing that.

Thanks Yooper! Do you see any issue with bringing the keg up to room temp? Would this get faster results?

erockomania said:

Thanks Yooper! Do you see any issue with bringing the keg up to room temp? Would this get faster results?

Click to expand...

It's already cold and carbed. Just toss 2-3 oz of hops in a sanitized bag into the keg and let it sit in the fridge for 2 weeks.

I also regularly dryhop in the keg at fridge temps. It works fine, there's no reason to move that keg out of the fridge unless you need the space.