Mash Hopping?

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if I FWH but do a very slow runoff of second (and possibly third) runnings, the hops could spend upwards of 30-45 minutes at temps in the 150's before heating up to a boil. I'm guessing this would change the profile versus a "typical" FWH which only spends 10-15 minutes in that temp range while heating up to boil, right?

FWIW, I FWH most of my beers and they almost always spend 30min+ before boil. I find the bitterness is still quite present, although it comes across different on the palate.
 
FWIW, I FWH most of my beers and they almost always spend 30min+ before boil. I find the bitterness is still quite present, although it comes across different on the palate.

I FWH almost all of my beers, too, and my formulas say it provides less bittering than a 60M addition, but I wonder if that means some of the flavor/aroma sticks around, too? I don't mash hop mostly because I exchange my spent grain for eggs (as chicken feed) and I've heard the hops aren't good for chickens.
 
my formulas say it provides less bittering than a 60M addition, but I wonder if that means some of the flavor/aroma sticks around, too?

There's is a lower perceived bitterness from FWH, but the the actual IBUs are approx. 10% higher than a traditional bitter. Think about it. You're isomerizing the alpha acids for longer than you would if you just threw them into the rolling boil at the 60 min mark, so the IBU's have to be higher.

There is no measurable flavor difference in FWH versus Traditional Bitter (and Aroma is weak for both methods). Studies have proven any differences in flavor to be inconclusive (and otherwise meaningless) time and time again.
 
There's is a lower perceived bitterness from FWH, but the the actual IBUs are approx. 10% higher than a traditional bitter. Think about it. You're isomerizing the alpha acids for longer than you would if you just threw them into the rolling boil at the 60 min mark, so the IBU's have to be higher.

There is no measurable flavor difference in FWH versus Traditional Bitter (and Aroma is weak for both methods). Studies have proven any differences in flavor to be inconclusive (and otherwise meaningless) time and time again.

The beginning of this thread mentioned something about oils bonding and thus not being broken down, due to holding a certain temp for a period of time (as in mash hopping). I guess I never saw a definitive answer on that, but I did see that a few commercial beers mash hop, so there has to be a reason. My question was that if I do a FWH that mimics mash hopping by holding hops at a certain temp, while not having to mix them with my grain, would I get a similar affect?
 
I FWH almost all of my beers, too, and my formulas say it provides less bittering than a 60M addition, but I wonder if that means some of the flavor/aroma sticks around, too? I don't mash hop mostly because I exchange my spent grain for eggs (as chicken feed) and I've heard the hops aren't good for chickens.

D'oh! I should have remembered your comments from other FWH threads.

I definitely do get some flavor from FWH hops like Chinook, but that may be because it's Chinook & so noticeable.

From what I understand, there's a lot of great factual info from new studies in Stan Hieronymus' new book "For the Love of Hops" and I think I recall from the interview I heard with him that some has to do with FWH.

Cheers!
 
Good info on FWH. Now are there any studies like this on Mash hopping?

The presentation is mine, but I'm not the guy who started the thread.

I did some experimentation with mash hopping years back. I took three recipes that I had brewed a lot and was very familiar with and added mash hops in addition to the normal hop additions. I couldn't detect any difference whatsoever between the mash hopped beers and the normally hopped beers.
 
I saw a Magic Hat #9 Clone earlier today that called for mash hopping and that got the gears in the brain turning. I made an ale a while back. Currently I have a few bottles left, and everyone loves it because it tastes like a light lager and people say they could drink a ton of them. But I was really hoping for more citrusy flavoring hop aroma to come through. After seeing the Magic Hat Clone recipe I was thinking of mash hopping to try and bring more hop aroma to come through. I'll try the pellets, adding 1.5x the flavoring hops, and then continuing onto the normal hop schedule. I can report back how this affected the flavor as compared to the current recipe.
 
Well this has been a long and interesting conversation. I was in search of info on mash hopping since I now have a recipe for zoigl. In this recipe you only boil for 5 minutes so there would be no bitterness, just flavor and aroma. I was going to step mash but the gentleman who gave me the recipe is a big fan of decoction so I'm thinking that is why he was getting some bitterness in his beer. It was a wonderful beer when his brewery was open, too bad the management screwed it all up!
As far as FWH, I did this with my first IPA and loved it. You thought the hops were done tickling your tongue then 20 seconds later, BAM, you got hit with some more! We called it Aftershock IPA and it was a great beer. Need to do that again!
 
I've been brewing the Cream of Three Crops recipe found here https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f62/cream-three-crops-cream-ale-66503/ for a while now as my goto summer ale and experiment base. I think I will add something like 3 oz of a "C" hop in the mash and not have any other hops additions to see what the results will be. I know what the base recipe taste and smells like so well that I think this is a worth while experiment. I will report back on it ASAP.
 
Mash hopping works best with soft water, which is probably why some swear by it and why some say it is a waste of hops.

Also, if you are going to bother with experimenting, and as home brewers you should, you need to examine not only the results but also potentially why you got those results even if they were favorable. If mash hopping sucked for you then perhaps try it with a different water profile, hop, or beer style before you proclaim "been there, done that, hated it". Otherwise the jury will still be out.
 
I've been getting good results mash hopping my Lagers. I'm not looking for overpowering hop flavors or aromas, just a good balance and clean flavor. Mash hopping has done this for me.
 
I've been getting good results mash hopping my Lagers. I'm not looking for overpowering hop flavors or aromas, just a good balance and clean flavor. Mash hopping has done this for me.

Out of curiosity, have you compared them to exactly the same thing without mash hops?
 
Out of curiosity, have you compared them to exactly the same thing without mash hops?

I've played around with the same Bo Pils recipe for over a year. I have changed the malt bill very little but have tried various hop additions and hop stands. It just seemed I couldn't get that smooth hop flavor, there was always a little harsh bite or aftertaste. Mash hopping seemed to cure that for me.

The other two beers I've been concentrating on is Munich Dunkel and Oktoberfest which are much more malt forward so these beers have less mash hops and just enough to balance the brew.

I also did a few IPL's with Maris Otter and Amarillo and Simcoe awhile back. I used double the amount of mash hops verses my Pils and I had very good hop aroma and flavor. I brought a couple growlers to my club and they were all impressed. Many couldn't believe I didn't dry hop them. These two beers pretty much convinced me mash hopping works.

It could also have something to do with my brewing system? I brew 2.5 gal BIAB with either a step mash or Schmitz Decoction so maybe the full volume and long mash rests help dissolve those hop oils a little better than a traditional mash?
 
I have done quite a quick scan of this thread and didn't see whether the following is answered.

Based on the chemistry described in this thread I think that mash hopping is a good way to get aroma from the hops into (and staying in) beers that are aged?

I am going to try it tonight - will add all the aroma hops in the mash and add a bittering hop as FWH. This is for an american brown ale which will get some honey in the boil to bring the ABV up so its good for ageing.
 
I've been brewing the Cream of Three Crops recipe found here https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f62/cream-three-crops-cream-ale-66503/ for a while now as my goto summer ale and experiment base. I think I will add something like 3 oz of a "C" hop in the mash and not have any other hops additions to see what the results will be. I know what the base recipe taste and smells like so well that I think this is a worth while experiment. I will report back on it ASAP.

How did this turn out?
 
what i can tell you all is this- mash hop and FWH seem to keep flavor and aroma in my lagers AND reduce the bitterness.

i made an IPL with a ton of citra, and while its high AA hop the beer was noticeably less bitter than you would expect based on IBUs/hop amounts. still plenty of flavor, just not as bitter as you'd expect from an India. in my opinion- just the right amount of bitter.

now- i have very clean, very low alkalinity but high pH water, use a little gypsum to get pH down to low 5s, and i brew in a bag with pellet hops. most of the mash hops stay in the bag, but not all. sometimes i FWH in the bag, sometimes i've just dumped into the wort as i didnt do a sparge at all.

i really do think that given an appropriate style of beer, mash hop and FWH will lower the percieved bitterness while keeping a good amount of flavor and aroma. my lager is hoppy in flavor but just a little touch of a smooth bitter to cleanse the palate. and the IPL was full of hop flavor and aroma, but no harsh bitterness that overpowers the lager. ( this is my pet peeve with most commercial IPLs i've seen, way too much bitterness. a thin wort just cant stand up to it. mash hop and FWH have made it easy to create an IPL that actually has hop-to-wort balance.)

if you're a crazy hophead and love the bitter- well obviously this is gonna be a waste of hops to you. the only reason i could see a hophead having a reason to try mash/FWH is if you wanted to layer half a dozen different hops in one beer. you could get smooth aromas/flavors from some mash/FWH varieties, bitterness from others at 90, another and 60, and then the typical volatile aroma/flavor from normal late additions, dry hops with another variety, etc.

but it really would be a good idea for anyone who does not have low alkalinity water to do some real research and see if this is a deciding factor in whether or not mash/FWH will work for them. the fact that it works so well in lagers and other lighter body beers leads me to think that it may be a deciding factor- all your traditional lager producing regions have relatively low alkalinity water. germany, the czech, austria, etc.
 
Keep us posted on how it works out. How much and what type of hops are going into your brown ale?

I mash hopped with Southern Aroma and Southern Promise (they are both South African hops, the former an aroma hop and latter a dual purpose), then FWH with southern promise and added fuggles with 20 minutes to go.

what went into the fermenter tasted really good. Obviously you can't make too much of an assessment based on the wort, but from i tasted i do expect quite a smooth bitterness. I will only be able to tell you how the flavour holds in a few months!
 
Has anyone noticed how these MH'd beers age?
Are the flavors and aromas more stable with this method whereas they tend to fade out rather quickly when the flavor hops are added to the boil or post fermentation?
 
Realize this is an ancient thread but I've recently read that mash hopping can potentially improve the oxidative stability of hazy IPAs. Idk why this would be the case, I can only reference this facebook post: https://www.facebook.com/scottjanish/photos/a.402062306829523/840504572985292/?type=3&theater

The comments suggest its covered in Janish, S. (2019) The New IPA: Scientific Guide to Hop Aroma and Flavour, Scottjanish.com, (author's facebook page) but I'm still waiting for my copy of the book and am wondering if anyone here knows the relationship between mash hopping and oxidative stability in the mean time...?
 
Realize this is an ancient thread but I've recently read that mash hopping can potentially improve the oxidative stability of hazy IPAs. Idk why this would be the case, I can only reference this facebook post: https://www.facebook.com/scottjanish/photos/a.402062306829523/840504572985292/?type=3&theater

The comments suggest its covered in Janish, S. (2019) The New IPA: Scientific Guide to Hop Aroma and Flavour, Scottjanish.com, (author's facebook page) but I'm still waiting for my copy of the book and am wondering if anyone here knows the relationship between mash hopping and oxidative stability in the mean time...?
I don't know the chemistry of it, but I believe first wort hopping is more of what you're looking for. Even though you boil the wort after steeping the hops for a bit, the beer retains more of the beta acids and other flavor and aroma compounds (as I was told).

I've done it for 3 brews and can confirm it does accentuate the flavors quite nicely.
 
More to the point, if you want really saturated hop flavor then in the words of Julian Schrago, hop everywhere you can. FWH, 45, 30, hopstand, below-isomerization hopstand. Heck, mash hopping won't hurt you any
 
Realize this is an ancient thread but I've recently read that mash hopping can potentially improve the oxidative stability of hazy IPAs. Idk why this would be the case, I can only reference this facebook post: https://www.facebook.com/scottjanish/photos/a.402062306829523/840504572985292/?type=3&theater

The comments suggest its covered in Janish, S. (2019) The New IPA: Scientific Guide to Hop Aroma and Flavour, Scottjanish.com, (author's facebook page) but I'm still waiting for my copy of the book and am wondering if anyone here knows the relationship between mash hopping and oxidative stability in the mean time...?

I'm 2/3 through my copy. It's chock full of relevant studies but utterly cringeworthy to read due to the poor writing and apparent lack of any proofreading/editing.
 
Dear all,
(sorry for the use of real metric numbering :)
was looking a bit on this concept of hop mashing and meerly from the point of re-using the big amount of "wasted hops" from a former NEIPA.

I normally use 200g hops in my 20L NEIPA as a hostand (80´C of 30-45min) and also 250g for dry hopping, and was consdering re-using these 2 hops additions is a Raw IPA, eg. a IPA only brought up til 80´C for 30min after mashing!

My idea would be to take the 200g hopstand hops from former NEIPA and use in the RIMS mashing I do whereoff they would get sprayed/flowen though of high level of recicuilating worth over 1½ hour, and after mashing make use of the former 250g dry hops as a 30min@80´C hopstand to extract bittering and aroma.

A rougf estrimate that even the dry hop have loss 25% of it bittering power in the former brew there should still be potential for giving a bitter unit over 40 and hence fine for a IPA.

Hence, is this would then be made of a Raw brew, where we do not boil, I assume the it shold hold a chance of both be bitter and hold aroma and foremost re-using the high amount of hops we use in a NEIPA!

Any thoughts on this idea?
(Got a NEIPA running and have stored the hops in fridge, so chances are I will try it off in the near future).

/Klaus
www.cheapfather.com
 
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