Question about dryhopping with pellets

So I tossed the KILLER Double IPA into the carboy last night - should be around 10.5% and smells INCREDIBLE.

So my question is, because I was heavily consumed on homebrew when I made the call....while siphoning into the carboy I would stop periodically and pour in a portion of the cascade pellets and then give the carboy a good swirl for 10-15 seconds and then siphon some more beer in and repeating the process until I got close to the bottom.

All and all I poured in 2 oz's of Cascade - probably 3/4 of it after the beer was totally transfered to the carboy, gave it one final good swirl for 15-20 seconds, air lock - done.

I checked it out his morning and there were no hop resin or residue floating on top and there was about 3/4 of sludge on the bottom. My thinking was to shake it up again for about 30-45 seconds to get everything circulating again - maybe gain some progress and flavor and then let it sit for another 6 days, since I had it in primary for 9 days.

Has anyone ever tried this approach - I am looking for pointers on what I did right and what I did wrong - again I was messed up and at the time these all seemed like good calls????

Should I be concerned about nothing floating on top initially this morning(with the 3/4 of solids at the bottom???

The good thing is I overfilled it about 3/4 a gallon and based on the carboy volume I should come away with about 5 gallons and change! It smells INCREDIBLE though!

Thanks for the advice guys

I'll just get it out of the way...you want to be especially careful in handling your fermented beer as introducing oxygen after primary fermentation causes oxidation and off flavors.

My 2 cents: as long as your hops are in the secondary, stop futzing with it.

Just rack and pour in the hops. No need to swirl.

My buddy that got me into it said introducing some oxygen in a high gravity may not be bad going into the carboy because it could potentially allow the yeast to ferment more...I guess that was where my idea came from....

freshbrew07 said:

My buddy that got me into it said introducing some oxygen in a high gravity may not be bad going into the carboy because it could potentially allow the yeast to ferment more...I guess that was where my idea came from....

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Before fermentation starts aerating your wort is a good thing...after fermentation occurs, introducing more oxygen is generally a bad thing.

I just dumped my pellets into the carboy then racked into the carboy. Ofcourse the pellets floated on the wort, but they saturated after a few days and sank to the bottom. I didn't want to aerate the beer so I just left them. Turned out well for me.
I think I would try to avoid getting O2 into a beer after it has fermented. My understanding is that it is a good thing for the first day or so of fermentation but after the process really takes off O2 only hurts the beer.
Craig

Seeing that I may have made a bad call introducing oxygen into the carboy and all - can I remedy the risk of oxidation any way - keg it sooner than normal or let it sit the standard week? I mean there was occasional airlock movement in the carboy....?

I'd let it sit until you're done dryhopping. Then siphon it to the keg. If any damage was done to it by oxygenating it, it can't be improved by moving it now. Hopefully, you didn't oxidize it and maybe the slight off-gassing protected it.

It should be fine, and the amount of hops should help cover any off-flavors anyway!

freshbrew07 said:

Seeing that I may have made a bad call introducing oxygen into the carboy and all - can I remedy the risk of oxidation any way?

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As a matter of fact you CAN improve the beer's chances by........





LEAVING IT ALONE!!!! :rockin:

freshbrew07 said:

Seeing that I may have made a bad call introducing oxygen into the carboy and all - can I remedy the risk of oxidation any way - keg it sooner than normal or let it sit the standard week? I mean there was occasional airlock movement in the carboy....?

Click to expand...

I'm not going to make a recommendation, just ask a question to the more knowledgeable folks on this forum.
If you inadvertently introduced O2 to a beer in the secondary, could you cause the yeast to use some/all of the O2 by feeding them some more sugar? Early in the ferment I know the yeast are using O2 in their reproduction, could you get the same affect by adding some more wort to your beer in the secondary to cause another fermentation period? Isn't some of what allows bottle conditioned beers to age so well is that the active yeast in the bottle uses the O2?

Just asking questions.

As for your beer, it will probably be fine but may not age as well as a beer that was less agitated. If the responses to my questions above are positive, maybe you could add a little sugar at kegging time to naturally carbonate the beer in the keg.

Craig