Experimental Ideas

I was wondering if anyone had tried a couple of things that I've been curious about:

1) Steeping hops in dilution water: Since it's generally easier to do a partial boil of 2-3 gallons for an extract recipe, and water it down to the proper gravity and volume of 5 gallons in the fermenter, has anyone tried steeping their hops in the dilution water while it's boiling, to take advantage of the lower gravity? Might be able to get better hop utilization, but on the other hand you normally wouldn't be boiling that water for as long as the wort. Perhaps for the aroma/flavor additions?

2) Multiple yeasts: What kind of results could you expect from using at least two different pitching yeasts? Depending on the ratio, could you shape the final flavor? Or would the strains battle to the death in the fermenter?

3) Flavored syrups: I have some half-full bottles of Torani syrups that aren't being used. SWMBO wants to toss them, but I was thinking I might be able to make an interesting beer by integrating some of that into the wort. I've got Chocolate Milano, Hazelnut, and Irish Cream flavors. I was thinking maybe an extra-chocolate stout, a hazel-nut-brown ale, and an Irish cream cream stout. Or something. I would guess that the sugars in the syrups are fermentable, meaning mostly just the flavor would remain, so I probably wouldn't want to use entire half-bottles, too strong.

Disclaimer: I have not yet brewed anything, and none of these experiments would be used for my first batch (probably coming up within the next month). But there will be a second batch...

EDIT (1/26/2009): In case anyone is curious, Torani syrup contains some preservatives, so unless you're going to keg and force-carb, it's not a workable flavor addition.

1) No, you don't want to not boil your steeping water and you will get decreased hop utilization, not increased.
2) Depends on the strains, but yes, you could get several different flavor profiles from different yeasts showing through in your beer. White labs even has a few different blends that you can buy commercially.
3) The world is your oyster. Maybe think about doing a stout and splitting it up in secondary and adding the flavors then?

Good luck, welcome to the obsession.

Really? I was pretty sure that John Palmer's How to Brew said that the higher gravity of the wort made hop extraction less efficient. Also, I wasn't talking about boiling the steeping water, but the water used to dilute the wort once you had finished the boil. If you pot is not large enough to boil 5 gallons, you would boil 2 or 3 with the grains/extract, and then pour that wort into sterilized water in the fermenter to get the full volume.

You are right, increasing gravity decreases hop utilization, I must have misread that part. The steeping grains, however, have only a very small effect on the wort's gravity however. If you want to get higher hop utilization by decreasing the gravity in your boil, look at the Late extract addition method (do a search).