How do I get the most out of my hops?

[Gemadrken]

Hello everybody

Over the last few years, the quality of my homebrew has greatly increased. The two biggest factors were switching from extract to all grain, and swapping from bottling to kegging.

I have experimented with hop quantity over probably 40-60 six gallon batches of all grain, and have hopped between 3-11oz per six gallons depending on the recipe. I typically dry hop between 1-4 oz per six gallons, with 1-3oz of flame out addition hops, and a balanced amount of bittering hops.

What I really want to focus on is maximizing flavor and aroma. I have noticed that between my homebrews and top quality commercial IPA's, mine seem to be lacking in the hop flavor and aroma. I have a few following questions.

-What do commercial breweries do different than the average homewrecker to get the most flavor and aroma out of their hops?

-I have noticed when dumping my trub that there a lot of hop particle, as well as aroma remaining. I often have 1 gallon of hoppy trub from my six gallons of beer, leaving me 5 for the keg. Can I stir that hoppy trub back into the beer extract any of that remaining hop aroma and flavor? Will stirring the trub back in at around 11-14 days after the initial yeast pitch cause any possible issues (assuming dry hops have been in 4+ days)? Is there any hop oils remaining to even extract at that point?

-What have you learned about getting different styles of bitter in your beers? Sometimes a harsh bitter is nice, sometimes a clean bitter is nice, and what do you do to achieve different styles of bitter?

-What are the best hop boil addition timings/dry hop timings that you have found get the best results?

-I use RO water + gypsym and CaCl. How important are water minerals in regards to hop flavor and aroma? Which ones and why?

-Is there anything else you have learned about hop utilization over the years?

-What are you favorite hop pellet combinations?

-Where do you buy your hops?

These are a lot of questions, and by no means does anybody need to answer all of them. If anybody is willing to impart any wisdom that would be great, I'm really trying to get my brews to the next level. I mostly brew pale ales and IPA's, but have brewed most popular styles.

Thanks!

 

[Gnomebrewer]

Number one, IMO, that breweries do better than the average homebrewer is avoid oxygen on the cold side. I recently brewed an APA with half fermented in kegs and transferred under pressure, the other half fermented in a HDPE bucket and transferred to a similarly prepared keg. The keg ferment had WAY more hop flavour and aroma, and better taste overall, compared to the HDPE ferment which had more grassiness and muted hop flavour/aroma. Fermenting in glass carboys or PET might be different (I don't have either to try). I see some recipes calling for crazy amounts of hops, like a few ounces per gallon in the whirlpool and again dryhop. I wonder if these brewers would benefit from fermenting in stainless and doing closed transfers - I'd guess they'd need way less hops to get the results they want, so the money saved on hops wouldn't take long to pay for a setup!

 

[FatDragon]

What are you aiming for? Some IPAs take it relatively easy in the flavor and aroma department (or were considered in-your-face ten years ago but bland by today's standards), while others try to hammer you on the bitterness and aroma, and then there's the NEIPA juice craze that makes the 100 point IPAs of yesterday seem bland and boring. So what are you going for? Sierra Nevada Pale Ale? Torpedo? Pliny? Sip o' Sunshine? Milkshake IPA?

My last couple pale ales, I've gone with a small bittering charge at FWH, around 3 oz. at whirlpool (typically around 70 C), trub and all into primary, 2 oz. on day two or three of primary, and another 2 oz. a couple days before bottling. This gives me what I want, which is a mild bitterness in the 30-40 IBU range, and a healthy level of flavor and aroma in the range of a fresh Deschutes' Fresh Squeezed IPA, and even though I bottle and have no particular cold-side O2 prevention measures beyond basic good practices, I still find the hoppiness to my liking after a couple months in the bottle, so I must be doing something right.

As for hops, I'm not up on most of the newer stuff, but Simcoe pairs really nicely with Cascade for a tasty APA, and just as well or better with Citra for something juicy.