How to make best use of wild hops

[ImperialStout]

My wife and I discovered some wild hops growing at an abandoned house, long since torn down. We think they are Centennial or Cascade hops based on appearance and smell, just a guess though. We plan to harvest them on Monday, Aug 25. 2014

I have a nice 10% IIPA recipe I have made before that uses Cascade pellet hops for late additions and dry hopping. Want to substitute these wild hops for the pellets. Did this last year but dried the hops before we used them. Have heard wet hopping produces a fuller, richer hop flavor and aroma so wanted to try it.

Have read the pellets produce between 10% and 25% more flavour / aroma then whole hops so plan to bump up the weight of the whole hops more than the recipe calls for. We plan to use the whole hops fresh off the vine for late additions and dried for dry hopping. I know not to use them for bittering as the AA content is unknown.

Would like to hear from people with experience in using fresh hops, either wild or cultivated, especially if you have converted a pellet hop recipe to a whole hop recipe.

Thanks,

Tom

 

[Yooper]

My wife and I discovered some wild hops growing at an abandoned house, long since torn down. We think they are Centennial or Cascade hops based on appearance and smell, just a guess though. We plan to harvest them on Monday, Aug 25. 2014

I have a nice 10% IIPA recipe I have made before that uses Cascade pellet hops for late additions and dry hopping. Want to substitute these wild hops for the pellets.

Have read the pellets produce between 10% and 25% more flavour / aroma then whole hops so plan to bump up the weight of the whole hops more than the recipe calls for. We plan to use the whole hops fresh off the vine for late additions and dried for dry hopping. I know not to use them for bittering as the AA content is unknown.

Would like to hear from people with experience in using fresh hops, either wild or cultivated, especially if you have converted a pellet hop recipe to a whole hop recipe.

Thanks,

Tom

"Wet" hops, that is, fresh off of the bine, generally need about 6 times the quantity of dried hops due to the moisture weight in them. That's a lot of debris in the boil kettle, so you may want to bump up your volume a bit.

I've never heard of cascades being wild/feral, but I live a long way away from you! Around here, most of the feral hops are cluster hops which were planted a very long time ago.

 

[ImperialStout]

That was just a guess on hop variety. Read where Cascade was developed by a university in Oregon in 56 and only released for commercial production in 75 or so. Centennial was released in 1990 or so. Not concerned on variety though, mostly need advice on how to wet hop. Did this last year but dried the hops before we used them. Have heard wet hopping produces a richer, fuller flavour and aroma profile.

Didn't know the weight would have to be that much greater. A person I know of has a small micro brewery but I don't know him well enough to ask advice. He wet hops one of his beers but has a device the hot wort passes through. Think it is called a cone. Blichmann sells one but is to expensive for me. Any wet hopping I do will have to be in the pot.

 

[nelven34]

Sorry to revive the older thread. But my brother found a bunch of hops on his property and so we're looking into brewing with them. I haven't been able to find a ton of great info.

1. How did yours turn out? Any tips? Does it matter which cones you use, or are they all good?
2. Why would it require more hops to brew due to the moisture content? Are they less effective/soluble compared to dried whole hops, or do you just mean "don't weigh out one ounce of wet hops for one ounce of normal hops recipe", but the hop volume will remain the same?

 

[slym2none]

2) take the moisture out of 1 ounce of wet hops, and you end up with (I think) .2 ounces of dry hops, like you would find in a pellet. You need to use app. 5 times the amount of wet hops as you would dry to account for the water-weight.