Hi there!
I've made a few lambics so far, and never used aged hops before, 'cause I never found the utility to it. Now I have a 60 gallons wine barrel that I'm going to fill with a few friends. Some of them have a ton of aged hops and suggest to use it. Is it really useful?
My assumptions are that aged hops were traditionnaly used to get a maximum antiseptic qualities for a minimum of IBU's when they let the wort cool down in large coolships, letting it be inoculated by ambient yeasts and bacterias. But my assumptions on modern lambic brewing are that is it just useless. We put the boiled wort in a sanized carboy witch is sealed, and we pitched a big healty culture of yeast, and then carefully selected healty bacteria cultures. Then when I transfert to the barel, I already have over 5% alcohol, a low pH, and an army of yeasts and bacterias. Does the aged hops really needed for anti-septic qualities, or if only a few grams of whater pellet hops to give me around 5-7-8 ibus is alright? (which will lead in a way less volume loss)
Thanks!
I've made a few lambics so far, and never used aged hops before, 'cause I never found the utility to it. Now I have a 60 gallons wine barrel that I'm going to fill with a few friends. Some of them have a ton of aged hops and suggest to use it. Is it really useful?
My assumptions are that aged hops were traditionnaly used to get a maximum antiseptic qualities for a minimum of IBU's when they let the wort cool down in large coolships, letting it be inoculated by ambient yeasts and bacterias. But my assumptions on modern lambic brewing are that is it just useless. We put the boiled wort in a sanized carboy witch is sealed, and we pitched a big healty culture of yeast, and then carefully selected healty bacteria cultures. Then when I transfert to the barel, I already have over 5% alcohol, a low pH, and an army of yeasts and bacterias. Does the aged hops really needed for anti-septic qualities, or if only a few grams of whater pellet hops to give me around 5-7-8 ibus is alright? (which will lead in a way less volume loss)
Thanks!