Storing Hop Pellets

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berkeleybrew

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If I have left over hop pellets, can I just put them in a zip lock, throw 'em in the fridge, and be able to use them a few weeks later? Or do they go bad? How would one store left over hops?
 
I keep 'em in the fridge, in a bottle or zip lock, right next to my batteries. Never noticed any degradation.
 
Ditto- Foodsaver vacuum sealer and then into the fridge.

Foodsaver also works great with whole hops, corn sugar, and DME.
 
I buy columbus pellets by the pound (actually 2 lb, got a deal) and freeze them. I just put a clip on the bag to keep it from dumping when I open the door. I haven't noticed any changes even after a year.

Bear in mind that any hops you buy this time of year are probably a year old already and they were just refigerated. New hops are just starting to be available from the 2006 harvest.
 
Bump.

I have a 1/2 bag of hops left over from a January brew. About 1 oz. they were not in the fridg, just laying in a back room. I'd guess a few days when the house was locked up it got over 85 F.

Think they might still be used, maybe for a dry hopping?
 
NO!

Smell them. If they smell good (not likely) then go ahead and use them for late additions or dry hopping. Otherwise, you could use them for bittering if you had no other hops. But you're probably better off tossing them. I don't know how to assess bittering quality, but if they smell anything less than amazing I would not use them for aroma or flavor.

I have found that nothing short of vacuum sealed in the freezer is good enough for more than a few weeks. Whatever ziplocs I had seemed to fail to seal, and let in some air. Though I suppose if you had good sealing bags, that could be OK as long as you pressed "all" of the air out first and kept them as cold as you could.
 
NO!

Smell them. If they smell good (not likely) then go ahead and use them for late additions or dry hopping. Otherwise, you could use them for bittering if you had no other hops. But you're probably better off tossing them. I don't know how to assess bittering quality, but if they smell anything less than amazing I would not use them for aroma or flavor.

I have found that nothing short of vacuum sealed in the freezer is good enough for more than a few weeks. Whatever ziplocs I had seemed to fail to seal, and let in some air. Though I suppose if you had good sealing bags, that could be OK as long as you pressed "all" of the air out first and kept them as cold as you could.

tks. probably wil dump them since I didn't pay for them anyway :cross:
 
I have several bags of unused hops that I store in my closet. Either vacuum sealed or Ziploc bag. they all smell amazing when I open them for brew day. My closet swings from 62 - 77 F over the 18 months I've kept them there. Haven't had any problems, but in the freezer they will go from now on!
 
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