HBC 342 hops

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slicksmix

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Hello,

I was wondering if anyone has heard of this new hop strain. all i can find by googling it is it has high AA, so im guessing this is a strain for IPA's. Any info on it would be awesome.

Thanks
 
Last months issue of BYO had an article about companies that are finding new hop strains to produce for home brewers. The hop that you mention was mentioned in that article.
 
Thanks for the reply. Is there a way to read the article online

Also does it list it characteristics?
 
These are the highlights from the article.

Developed by Select Botanicals Group, the same people that developed Simcoe.

Does not have a name yet, HBC stands for Hop Breeding Company.

Strong floral quality to it with some soft fruit notes. A little bit tropical with some blueberry mixed in. Mango and tangerine have been used as descriptors as well.

Russian River Brewing Company's Happy Hops used it

Dogfish Head Brewing used it in Savor Flowers.

AA Range of 10 - 12%

Only 2000 lbs expected to be harvested this year. Significant volume expected to be available for the 2012 crop.
 
Opps, I made a mistake.

Ignore the previous post, that is HBC 369. The HBC part of the name threw me off. I have not heard about HBC 342.

Sorry.
 
Update: Just picked up my BB hopnog (which contained said hops) I will do two batches together with different hop schedules, and i will update this thread when its done (cant wait!), that way more people will lean about these mysterious little buggers!
 
At the moment I think the only way to come by this hop is in the Brewers Best Christmas beer kit.
 
It comes with BB Hopnog. I got some last weekend, but haven't brewed it yet. It has three ounces of whole leaf HBC 342 and 3/4 ounce of bittering hops, I forget which. I stuck all the hops in the freezer until I have a chance to use it. It came with a free growler too, which my wife wasn't thrilled about.

Has anyone brewed their kit yet? I'm thinking of splitting the new stuff between 15, 5, and dry hop.
 
I just brewed the Hop Nog Kit, and I did a Continual hopping schedule, in the primary for about a week and my brew room smells like sweet hoppy goodness all the time now. :D
 
It comes with BB Hopnog. I got some last weekend, but haven't brewed it yet. It has three ounces of whole leaf HBC 342 and 3/4 ounce of bittering hops, I forget which. I stuck all the hops in the freezer until I have a chance to use it. It came with a free growler too, which my wife wasn't thrilled about.

Has anyone brewed their kit yet? I'm thinking of splitting the new stuff between 15, 5, and dry hop.

So far I've got the first batch fermenting. I chose to do the exact same schedule. I will probably rack to secondary some time this week to dry hop.

Question is do I dry hop for one or two weeks with the last oz
 
So far I've got the first batch fermenting. I chose to do the exact same schedule. I will probably rack to secondary some time this week to dry hop.

Question is do I dry hop for one or two weeks with the last oz

I'm going to dry hop for 2 weeks so I can really get the most of the experimental hops. I'm going to leave it in primary for a few more weeks, though, so it's freshest around New Year's Eve. Let us know how yours turns out!

I finally brewed my batch on sunday, and did that schedule (1 oz at 15 and 5). I had never used whole hops before, and my autosiphon clogged and broke. I ended up straining into my carboy. Man did it smell good.
 
I'm going to dry hop for 2 weeks so I can really get the most of the experimental hops. I'm going to leave it in primary for a few more weeks, though, so it's freshest around New Year's Eve. Let us know how yours turns out!

I finally brewed my batch on sunday, and did that schedule (1 oz at 15 and 5). I had never used whole hops before, and my autosiphon clogged and broke. I ended up straining into my carboy. Man did it smell good.

I never rack from the bk. I dump the wort through a strainer, when it gets clogged up I dump the hops out and repeat

Also it was the first time I used whole cone hops... pretty cool
 
I was going to do one batch as a pale ale at 35-40IBU with only the HBC342 and then do a second batch as more of a barleywine (like the stone one) at 90IBU with the millenium as the bittering hop, and then the HBC342 as the flavor/aroma/dryhop. This should give a pretty good idea of what the hop can do (and leave me with a little extra to play with after evaluating the beers) Any ideas/suggestions on this?
 
Yeah, cherry life savors aroma from the El Dorado hop... Maybe good for a cherry beer ???

I did a smash last yeah from 2-row and El Dorado hops,made a pretty good beer, but I would use them only for aroma additions. Very sweet almost candy like scent.
 
Hello,

I was wondering if anyone has heard of this new hop strain. all i can find by googling it is it has high AA, so im guessing this is a strain for IPA's. Any info on it would be awesome.

Thanks

I found some info by searching for the patent application. There is a lot of detail here, but unfortunately, not a lot to go on as far as aroma and flavor profile are concerned.

This seems to be another Select Botanicals patent-the-offspring-of-federally-researched-and-paid-for-unpatented-parents idea (that was a lot of hyphenating). Lovely. I hope companies in support of non-patented hops (e.g. IndieHops) begin to take off. It would be nice to see a shift in the craft beer market away from these highly marketed (and therefore sought after) patented hops being pushed by corporate America.
[gets off soapbox]
 
Assuming the reports are correct, that these hops are very candy/fruit like, what sort of beer would you use them for?

Doesn't sound like a good IPA candidate to me... still I'd like to try them, just don't know where.
 
I'm noty sure candy is a good descriptor. Here is the office release from Hopunion:

i would agree, not candy like at all. i can see the watermellon from the farmhouse brewing description, but that is very mild to me. it is very floral and aromatic, almost like glacier meets high alpha acidity like centennial. i would expect more comparison to centennial actually, but it really isn't like it either. truely unique and good for hopping all the way through the beer (made single hop HBC342 hopnog for one batch).
 
Nice! So where do we find it now?

i think its pretty much sold out everywhere. there is a place in Australia that will ship, but it is really expensive. there is a vendor site listed above that had it earlier in the season. i would look for it in the 2012 season though.
 
Have to revitalize this thread. I just had an ipa brewed at Mad Fox Brewery in Falls Church, Va. They used this hop exclusively and it was delicious. Grapefruit flavors but not too hash and not too much bite, quite smooth. And I'll be damned if there's not a watermelon smell to this beer! I was skeptical by the reports of watermelon, but it sure as hell was there! I'm looking forward to getting my hands on some to make up my own ipa
 
i think its pretty much sold out everywhere. there is a place in Australia that will ship, but it is really expensive. there is a vendor site listed above that had it earlier in the season. i would look for it in the 2012 season though.

I just snagged some at Farmhouse Brewing. Ended up being 8 bucks for 4 ounces shipped to my door.
 
IffyG said:
I just snagged some at Farmhouse Brewing. Ended up being 8 bucks for 4 ounces shipped to my door.

Very nice. Looks like I will be placing an order soon! The ipa I had was super light. On appearances it looked more like a kolsch. Not sure if I want to go that route or darken it up a bit
 
Just got mines from Hop City in Atlanta. The description the beer gods there gave me was watermelon although that essence is hard to detect in the aroma. I'm going to use a 60 min half ounce and a 5 min half ounce in my upcoming, and most certainly epic, wheat beer. The additional ingredients are: 4 Lbs Bavarian Wheat DME, 2 Lbs Pilsen DME with steeping grains of 8 oz Soft Red Wheat/White Wheat malt, 4 oz honey malt, 8 oz carafoam, 4 oz victory and a Wyeast 1010 Amercian Wheat Ale. This will be my third brew.
 
Have to revitalize this thread. I just had an ipa brewed at Mad Fox Brewery in Falls Church, Va. They used this hop exclusively and it was delicious. Grapefruit flavors but not too hash and not too much bite, quite smooth. And I'll be damned if there's not a watermelon smell to this beer! I was skeptical by the reports of watermelon, but it sure as hell was there! I'm looking forward to getting my hands on some to make up my own ipa

ain't that some crap. they open a brewery after i move away. i grew up a few blocks from that place. how is it?
 
I'm finally brewing my HopNog kit with these hops. I'm going to add an ounce at 10 minutes before flame out and then dry hop the rest for two weeks and then age it in a 5 gallon whiskey barrel for a month or so. I'm keeping the whiskey barrel wet with some gin as the whiskey gin combo is a flavor I'm aiming for. I won't know for a long time how good it is.
 
Maybe some extra juniper berries in the barrel with the gin? Sounds interesting. I would try it if I had some good gin.
 
Next year, look for a hop called MOSAIC. This is the commercial version of it, and it is being harvested now for next year production.
 
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