How do you dryhop?

I will be dryhopping my first IPA in a week or two and I'm looking for some pointers.

I'm thinking about just throwing 1oz of Cascades in the secondary but I guess I'm concerned about the effects of the loose hops floating around there as far as siphoning is concerned. So if I were to use a small bag and weigh it down, should I worry about sanitation of the weight and bag? What do you do?

I just siphon it out normally with my auto-siphon, making sure I have the little black cap thingy on the bottom.

Whatever hop particles get into the bottling bucket, usually stay at the bottom, and what little doesn't gets trapped in thin yeast layer at the bottom of my bottles.

I've never had a clarity issue due to dry hopping in the secondary.

-D

I use pellet hops so when I dryhop I just put them in a hop bag with a glass marble. I definitely sanitize both the bag and the marble. I find some hops still tend to escape so I'm not sure if there is that much benefit since the hops will settle out anyway.

you can try using a knee high nylon stocking with a marble in it as well instead of a grain bag. toss in the hops and the marble (after sanatizing) and tie it shut, nothing should get out of that litle bad boy and they are cheep and disposable.

I have a mesh bag which I boil in some water, let it steep for a while, throw an ounce or so of hops in then tie the bag up and throw it straight in the keg. Loose, unbagged hops are a menace IMO.

My suggestion: Do it how ever is convenient for you. if you have a hop bag, try it. if not, toss em in loose.(which is how I've always have dry hopped). Either way would work.

I only dry hop with whole hops and they float to the top. Never had a problem.

A question for those of you that use a bag or nylon hose: If you ferment in a glass carboy, doesn't the bag or nylon hose swell up and become difficult to remove from the rather narrow neck?

Rhoobarb said:

A question for those of you that use a bag or nylon hose: If you ferment in a glass carboy, doesn't the bag or nylon hose swell up and become difficult to remove from the rather narrow neck?

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yeah but thats part of the reasonI like the nylons. If I destroy them I dont care cuz I was gonna throw it out anyway.

I just toss them in- pellets or whole leaf. They float, then they sink. I just rack off of them. I tried the bag thing, but it was hard to get it through the mouth of the carboy, and then it was hard to get it out!

Just don't try to get every last drop of beer (which should apply anyway to prevent carrying over yeast) and you will be fine.
I've had to cut the plugs in half to get them to fit in the carboy.

I just did an IPA that I dry hopped in the secondary. I used the long skinny dry hop bag from Seven Bridges. I boiled the bag and some marbles. Cleaned my hands with sanitizer as well as I could, loaded the bag with leaf hops and marbles and then dropped it in to the Better Bottle. Eveything worked great, except I didn't use enough marbles and the bag only partially submerged. Two ounces of leaf hops has a lot of displacement. No problem getting the bag out afterwords.

If using pellits, I boil some water in the microwave and then dump the pellts in the hot water, then spatuala the rehydrated hops into the carboy. No bag. The hops eventually sink to the bottom anyway.

I use hop pellets. Basically, I just sanitize a nylon and a SS bolt, then I throw the pellets and the bolt in the nylon, tie it up, and toss it in. I dry hop at the end of my primary since I don't secondary any of my beers, but it's the same idea. BTW, a cut-up coat hanger with a small bend in the end works well for pulling the nylon or hop bag out of a carboy ;-)

Thanks again, I think I may just throw the pellets in and use the auto siphon with the cap on seeing as they'll settle out.

Thanks!

hoplobster said:

I will be dryhopping my first IPA in a week or two and I'm looking for some pointers.

I'm thinking about just throwing 1oz of Cascades in the secondary but I guess I'm concerned about the effects of the loose hops floating around there as far as siphoning is concerned. So if I were to use a small bag and weigh it down, should I worry about sanitation of the weight and bag? What do you do?

Click to expand...

Been there done that:

1-gallon Paint Strainers from Lowes. Nylon. $3.00 for a two-pack. Let them free float and then strain them with this doohickey on the end of your racking cane. This was the clearest brew I've done so far...

Works wonders and you'll find other uses for these things:

BierMuncher said:

Been there done that:

1-gallon Paint Strainers from Lowes. ...

Click to expand...

Good idea; I like that!

This will be my first attempt at dry hopping. From reading this thread, it sounds like the use of a hop sock and/or weights is optional, but should be sanitized if used. Only one person mentioned sanitizing the hop pellets (what I'll be using). Should I boil my hop pellets, or would it be better not to?

I've dry hopped one brew, and I just threw the pellets in whole, no sanitizing, no worries.

You have to remember, you're doing this in the secondary, and there's lots of alcohol in the brew, which should, in theory, stave off many of the nasties.

When I siphoned from my better bottle to the bottling bucket, I put a fine mesh bag in the carboy, and then inserted my autosiphon into the bag. One pump, the beer was flowing fine and it worked fabulously. I got the bag in a kit some dude sold on CL, so I'm not sure where he got it, but it worked great, and the bag cleaned up just fine so I can reuse it next time.

forkmantis said:

This will be my first attempt at dry hopping. From reading this thread, it sounds like the use of a hop sock and/or weights is optional, but should be sanitized if used. Only one person mentioned sanitizing the hop pellets (what I'll be using). Should I boil my hop pellets, or would it be better not to?

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Just toss em in. Hops were initially introduced to beer as a preservative. Assuming you haven't openned the package and allowed them to roll around a cat litter box...they should be fine.

Don't boil. Even a short boil may extract some of the bittering oils and the intent of dry hopping is to derive aroma and slight flavor components...not so much to bitter the beer.

Thats why I throw them in a half pint of boiled water. The hops absorb the water and hopefully kill any surface bacteria (pellets anyway).

Excellent. Thanks for the replies, gentlemen. I will now proceed with confidence.