Not vacuum sealing hops

I bought 4 lbs of hops and so far I have opened some of them and not vacuum seemed them. I just forced all the air out and wrapped multiple rubber bands around the outside. I just wanted to hear from people who have not vacuum sealed in the past and can share their experience?

I don't reseal mine either but I do wrap them in a zip lock bag and store them in the freezer. I have not had any issues with them getting bad but they might loose some strength over time.

I've had hops stored in a similar way in the freezer. I go as far as to wrap the bags in Al foil to keep out all light. After around 6 months I noticed a decrease in the nice odor, even after warming. This was noticable with Cascade and Cenntenial. The citrus just wasn't as strong. Then again maybe I had a cold that day. The beer turned out great. I try to use hops stored in this way over the course of a month or so. I've just begun buying in bulk, so that may change. I may find someone with a vacuum sealer and break down the pounds to a few ounces at a time.

I guess the ?? is, why not vacuum seal them? I mean if your gonna invest in ##'s of hops why not make another small investment in a sealer. $60-70 and you got a good one.
Just my o2 but that wasn't your ?? Sorry I will butt out now

cascade loses it's AA as well as its smell VERY quickly...

I would invest in a foodsaver as that will keep your hops fresher much longer. check out the hops age tool in beersmith and you'll see.

i have 9 pounds of 2008 pellets and I don't expect the AA to degrade more than 10% over the next year.

If you don't wanna invest in a foodsaver, do an Alvin Vacuum Sealer. For $30, you can vacuum seal and freeze in mason jars.

I do this and love it.

shortyjacobs said:

If you don't wanna invest in a foodsaver, do an Alvin Vacuum Sealer. For $30, you can vacuum seal and freeze in mason jars.

I do this and love it.

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That is awesome. I was about to lay out some serious coin on a foodsaver when all I wanted to do was seal mason jars for hops. This will be perfect, thanks!

A Pump-N-Seal runs about $30 as well and works like a champ on jars. It can also be used to seal bags (with a little finessing). I'm pretty happy with mine even though it took a few weeks to arrive.

HarkinBanks said:

That is awesome. I was about to lay out some serious coin on a foodsaver when all I wanted to do was seal mason jars for hops. This will be perfect, thanks!

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Yup, it's a bit pain-in-the-assy to have to pump them down by hand, (takes about 30 seconds for a 1 qt mason jar half filled with hops). I happen to have one of these:

Which is a battery powered vacuum pump for ziploc baggies. The baggies are a piece of crap, (lose vacuum quickly through the POS seals), but the vacuum pump works well. I use that to pump the mason jars down to around -15 inches mercury, then the brake bleeder shown in the Alvin link to get down to about -25 inches mercury. Takes maybe 10 seconds of hand pumping then.

The 30 seconds of hand pumping, (without the battery powered gizmo), per mason jar is still a snap though, (since I rarely use more than one or two hop varieties per batch), and it is quick and cheap, plus one less electric appliance to take up space.

I use ziploc vacuum bags. Very cheap. They don't hold a seal very well by themselves so I just put some glue or epoxy over the valve in the bag. (Hopefully the fumes from the glue don't leak into my hops!)

Wal-Mart carries the Seal-a-Meal for under $50. Works just as well as the foodsaver, though the foodsaver has some nice features like the roll holder, etc. I just broke down my 5 lb Hops Direct order into 2oz bags in a couple of evenings with one.