First dry hopping questions. Double IPA

[Mister-Kingdom]

Hi I'm in the middle of brewing my first IPA. Its a single hop IPA. I really like Citra hops so that's the hop I chose to use. It's a one gallon batch to test the recipe. So far I've added a total of an once of citra to the boil. With my hop schedule my IBU calculator calculates its at about 70 IBUs right now.

Now I'm almost done with primary fermentation and I'm almost ready to rack over to secondary. My recipe that i originally created from looking at other recipes and tweaking it to my own, calls for 0.6 ounces of citra to dry hop for 7 days. My question is: If I really like the taste when I rack to secondary should I still do the dry hoping? How much flavor/bitterness will this amount add? I'm a big fan of hop flavor but not really bitterness.

Thanks for any advice.

 

[Dirt_McGirt]

Dry hop additions won't add any bitterness, just flavor and aroma. You may like the taste of the beer at this point, but if you really want the citra character to be prominent, you probably don't want to skip the dry hop. If you're impatient to get it bottled, I'd say you could get away with only doing 4-5 days of dry hop, especially with how much you're planning to add to a 1 gal. batch.

Finally, it's a bit of personal preference, but most people here (myself included) will tell you that racking to secondary is not only not necessary to dry hop, but is probably worst for IPAs, etc., where the hop flavor would be more at risk of oxidation and skunking from the transfer. Up to you, though.

 

[Mister-Kingdom]

Ok so do you think I could throw the hops in now and bottle in 7 days. It's pretty much done fermenting. By the way they are pellet hops so should I use less since they are pellets or does it matter?

 

[Craftfan]

Ok so do you think I could throw the hops in now and bottle in 7 days. It's pretty much done fermenting. By the way they are pellet hops so should I use less since they are pellets or does it matter?

Yes you can. There is some discussion about waiting until fermentation is complete because of the possibility of Co2 removing some of the hop character, but I don't beleive this has been proved or disproved. Add now, or wait until you are sure fermentation is complete is up to you.

 

[jammin]

Yes you can. There is some discussion about waiting until fermentation is complete because of the possibility of

Recent studies/conversation presume that dry hopping prior to the completion of fermentation can result in the biotransformation of aromatic and flavor compounds of late addition and dry hops. Adding dry hops after fermentation is fully completed lends to the greatest "fresh out of the bag" character.

An interesting data point when considering how to shape one's brew

 

[slym2none]

Strange - I've been adding a small sugar addition when I dry-hop lately, after primary fermentation is complete, and I've come up with a very hoppy beer indeed. The rye pale ale I made recently is so hoppy, I can't tell it has rye in it, the Cascade is so over-the-top.

 

[Craftfan]

See what I mean? Feel free to dry hop now and bottle in 2-13 days.

 

[Mister-Kingdom]

Okay, Thanks everyone for your quick and simple help.