Dry Hopping Lagers

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fc-runner

fc-runner

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I was planning on dry-hopping a couple of lagers I have in the fridge when I move them to their secondary fermenter carboys (this weekend). Is the rule the same just the last 10 days? Usually my beer stays in the secondary fermentor for up to 2 months. I didn't know if temperature would make a difference in getting that Hops aroma (Hallertauer and Tettnanger) into the beer?
 
Dry hopping a lager is a little weird to me, and those hops are not typically used for dry hopping, but hell its homebrew give it a shot

rbrunner said:
Is the rule the same just the last 10 days?
Click to expand...

Rule? Don't get in the habit of asking HBT'ers about rules. I have learned from experience that this forum does not like to spoon feed people. Experiment, leave them in there a 10 days or two months, whatever

correct me if I am wrong master jedi's
 
I have dry-hopped a couple of lagers. I have a bock lagering right now that has been on the dry hops for a month now. I think the "rules" are bit different for lagers because of the lower temperature. Everything happens more slowly at 34*F!

I say go for it. I have so far used Crystal hops for dry-hopping lagers. Crystal is not too dissimilar from the hops you mention, so let 'em rip!
 
Excellent. That works for me! Since I have two batches I'll do just that. One batch for the requisite 2 months at 35 and the other for 10 days. Looking forward to it!
 
I did it a few times. Same procedure. Since lagers don't have this dominant easter profile it's very easy to overdo with it. Use your hops sparingly at least for the first time.
In another experiment for a pilsner I added hops for 1 min boil in to priming solution which added nice and fresh hop aroma. I think I liked it more then dryhop.
 
AdIn, makes a good point. I've never used more than 1/2 oz. of low alpha acid hops for dry hopping lagers.
 
AdIn said:
I did it a few times. Same procedure. Since lagers don't have this dominant easter profile it's very easy to overdo with it. Use your hops sparingly at least for the first time.
In another experiment for a pilsner I added hops for 1 min boil in to priming solution which added nice and fresh hop aroma. I think I liked it more then dryhop.
Click to expand...

Ok, now this is interesting. I have a corny keg of Dead Guy clone that I was planning on dry hopping with 1 - 2 oz of Amarillo. The keg is already carbonated and is just sitting around for extra conditioning. I was planning on putting the hops in a mesh bag, weighting it down with something heavy that won't mess up the beer, gently lowering it into the keg, leaving a thin string to retrieve the bag after 7-10 days, and dealing with the inevitable mess I will make lowering the bag of hops into carbonated beer and subsequently retrieving the bag.

Do you think I could just do a 1 minute mini-boil instead? Like boil up a quart of beer and just throw in the hops for 1 min, then strain and add directly to the keg?

Because that would be much, much easier, faster and cleaner.
 
AdIn said:
In another experiment for a pilsner I added hops for 1 min boil in to priming solution which added nice and fresh hop aroma.
Click to expand...

I steeped the kraeusen wort for my Liberty SMaSH lager in an ounce of hops at ~150ºF for ten minutes. Initial samples are showing a big, bright, hoppiness that you wouldn't expect from a beer that has only 3oz of low-alpha hops in the whole batch. It's only been lagering for ten days, but I think I'm in favor of hop teas for lagers. Bonus, you don't have to deal with straining dry-hops out of the beer or hop sacks -- the hop muck stays in the French press.:fro:
 
brewthunda said:
Ok, now this is interesting. I have a corny keg of Dead Guy clone that I was planning on dry hopping with 1 - 2 oz of Amarillo. The keg is already carbonated and is just sitting around for extra conditioning. I was planning on putting the hops in a mesh bag, weighting it down with something heavy that won't mess up the beer, gently lowering it into the keg, leaving a thin string to retrieve the bag after 7-10 days, and dealing with the inevitable mess I will make lowering the bag of hops into carbonated beer and subsequently retrieving the bag.

Do you think I could just do a 1 minute mini-boil instead? Like boil up a quart of beer and just throw in the hops for 1 min, then strain and add directly to the keg?

Because that would be much, much easier, faster and cleaner.
Click to expand...
Absolutely. There is no point boiling beer, use water. Also I'd go with only half a quart to avoid impacting FG of the beer. But I hope you realize that result will be a bit different. The hop aroma in this case will be different from dry hopping. It has been a wile I had Dead Guy, but I don't really remember any dry hop flavor of it.

BTW, in case of a keg you don't need to mess with a string or something like this. Simply transfer the beer from the keg to another empty keg by connecting out outlet to another out outlet and apply co2.
 
AdIn said:
Absolutely. There is no point boiling beer, use water. Also I'd go with only half a quart to avoid impacting FG of the beer. But I hope you realize that result will be a bit different. The hop aroma in this case will be different from dry hopping. It has been a wile I had Dead Guy, but I don't really remember any dry hop flavor of it.

BTW, in case of a keg you don't need to mess with a string or something like this. Simply transfer the beer from the keg to another empty keg by connecting out outlet to another out outlet and apply co2.
Click to expand...

Very cool. Yeah, I realize that Dead Guy has zero dry hop flavor, but I wanted to try something new. It's not an exact clone -I bumped up the ABV a bit to 7.4% and added a touch more bittering hops to balance that out. I just finished drinking the first keg and it was pretty amazing . . . but every time I went to smell it, I thought to myself, "man, this would be perfect if it just had a bit of hop aroma!"
 

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