Dry hop help

[MrStrangeBrew]

when im dry hopping with whole hops should i be sinking them to the bottom or can i just let them float on the top? does the same thing apply for pellets and plugs? if they do need to be sunk what do you use to weigh them down? put them in a bag with marbles or something like that?

 

[sharkuttack]

I found this episode of brew strong to be helpful.
http://thebrewingnetwork.com/shows/Brew-Strong/Brew-Strong-12-08-08-Dry-Hopping

i usually throw loose pellet hops in primary 1 week after beginning of fermentation and it has worked great.

 

[unionrdr]

I wait till after FG is reached,& the beer has mostly settled out to dry hop. The settling yeast drags the hop oils that cling to them down to the bottom as well. I keep more hop flavor that way.

 

[sharkuttack]

I wait till after FG is reached,& the beer has mostly settled out to dry hop. The settling yeast drags the hop oils that cling to them down to the bottom as well. I keep more hop flavor that way.

good point. with that said, cold crashing while dry hopping after fermentation is done is also an option

 

[MrStrangeBrew]

cold crashing? sorry im somewhat of a newb. Is that just chilling the beer for a while after fermentation is complete. so then im not doing anything wrong just tossing them in there cause the yeast brings the oils down anyways

 

[unionrdr]

cold crashing? sorry im somewhat of a newb. Is that just chilling the beer for a while after fermentation is complete. so then im not doing anything wrong just tossing them in there cause the yeast brings the oils down anyways

Cold crashing is fine if you're kegging. You get it down just above freezing to kill the yeast & make it settle. You're force carbing in that situation anyway. Not so with bottles. If you let the finished beer clear in primary till it's just a little hazy to dry hop,you'll retain more of the hop oils,since there are less yeasties to "drag them down". That's why I made the recommendation to let it sit for 3 weeks or more to clear to a slight haze. Plenty of yeast left to bottle condition. But not enough to drag most of the hop oils out,thus preserving more aroma/flavor from dry hopping to start with.

 

[rjwhite41]

Cold crashing is fine if you're kegging. You get it down just above freezing to kill the yeast & make it settle. You're force carbing in that situation anyway. Not so with bottles. If you let the finished beer clear in primary till it's just a little hazy to dry hop,you'll retain more of the hop oils,since there are less yeasties to "drag them down". That's why I made the recommendation to let it sit for 3 weeks or more to clear to a slight haze. Plenty of yeast left to bottle condition. But not enough to drag most of the hop oils out,thus preserving more aroma/flavor from dry hopping to start with.

You can cold crash with bottling. It doesn't kill the yeast, it makes them dormant and there will be enough left behind to carb your beer (unless you cold crash for an extremely long period of time, i.e. months). As far as dry hopping, wait until fermentation is finished (I've heard the hop oil thing a couple of times today, I don't know anything about that, but what I do know is that the aroma will be carried off with the co2 if you dry hop during active fermentation) and then you can just throw them directly into the beer. You can bag if you like, I never do. If you bag, you have to sanitize the bag and whatever you choose to weight it down with (a marble works fine I believe). Personally it seems like more hassle than it's worth.

 

[Yooper]

You can cold crash with bottling. It doesn't kill the yeast, it makes them dormant and there will be enough left behind to carb your beer (unless you cold crash for an extremely long period of time, i.e. months). As far as dry hopping, wait until fermentation is finished (I've heard the hop oil thing a couple of times today, I don't know anything about that, but what I do know is that the aroma will be carried off with the co2 if you dry hop during active fermentation) and then you can just throw them directly into the beer. You can bag if you like, I never do. If you bag, you have to sanitize the bag and whatever you choose to weight it down with (a marble works fine I believe). Personally it seems like more hassle than it's worth.

I'm with rjwhite. I just chuck the hops in, and then rack when I'm packaging (whether kegging or bottling). I'm good at siphoning, though. If you're not, you can try using sanitized bags. I wish I would have taken a picture, but today I racked a beer that was dryhopped with an ounce of pellets and an ounce of leaf hops. I gently put my racking cane under the floating hops, and start siphoning in the middle. I lower the racking cane as the level of the beer drops, until the floating hops and the trub meet and my siphoning is done. It takes some practice to do it perfectly, but it's definitely easier than it sounds!

I don't use hops bags or anything like that if I'm only using an ounce or two of dryhops. For three ounces or more, I usually do use bags because it's just easier to rack off of the dryhops when there is that many!

As far as cold crashing, you can do it whether bottling or kegging, it doesn't matter in the least. Drop the temp of the fermenter suddenly, and it'll clear really fast! Just a few days is all you need, but you can do it for much longer if you need/want to.

 

[unionrdr]

Huh. I was under the impression that they didn't just go dormant from cold crashing. I prefer to just let it sit in primary till it's slightly hazed to dry hop. Then bottle a week later.

 

[rjwhite41]

Yeast are pretty hardy. You'd have to freeze it to kill them and even then some would survive.