The 4 essential hops oils and the question of variety

[beervoid]

Hello everyone, so I have had this discussion with an old brewer friend of mine who made the following statement.

"All these different hops are just like brands and when you understand the profiles of the basic hops you can make any kind of beer with just a small variety of hops"

Now I did some research and as I understand it. there are essentially 4 main oils that are contributing to the difference of smell/flavor/aroma of hops. (source:http://beerlegends.com/chemistry-of-hops-and-alpha-acids)

Humulene Oil
Fragrance: woody, earthy, and herbal character.
Flavor: woody organic, linked to the spice in coriander, spicy flavor over long boils or mash

Myrcene Oil
Fragrance: tones of grapes, peaches, vanilla, wine and is balsamic like. woody, green, herbaceous, and peppery.
Flavor: orange-like and citrusy, with an earthy, even metallic flavor.

Caryophyllene oil
Fragrance: dry woody, spicy, earthy bouquet. sweet, clove. Provides hoppy character/aroma.
Flavor: strong dry wood, pepper, and earthy spice flavor. tones of citrus may come to the finish.

Farnesene Oil
Fragrance: magnolia flowers and having citrusy notes with green, woody, vegetative odor with hints of lavender.
Flavor: essence of herbs and organic wood-like offsets

Would this mean that basically with 4 different hops all high in one of these oils should take you anywhere you want to go in a recipe?

Any thoughts on this?

 

[roadkizzle]

There are many other essential and aromatic oils in hops than just those four.

Those are the four that normally have the largest percentage of the total amount of oils.

For instance geraniol and linalool were two additional oils that were highly sought after and drove a lot of the breeding around and from Cascades.

The oils combine and transform throughout the boiling and fermentation processes. That's what produces the majority of the difference between flavors.

That said. The four main oils do definitely have an impact on the category of hop flavor.

All citrusy/fruity hops will have a high proportion of Myrcene... But the exact type of fruity flavor is determined by the other oils. Amarillo is more defined as orangy. Cascade is more grapefruity. Citra is more lemony. Galaxy is more like passion fruit and there are other tropical fruit hops. There are also hops that taste like a honeydew melon.

Even then the different oils have different thresholds of perception. You can actually change what the hops taste like by adding more or less of a specific variety. You may suddenly get fruity flavors from hops that wouldn't normally show it if you throw a lot more into the boil.

In the book Hops by Stan Hieronymus he talks about a brewer looking for an elusive hoppiness for his IPA. He found that he felt he got the best hop flavor that he was looking for when he actually reduced the amount of hops that he was using. Because it dropped some of the oils below the perception threshold allowing the flavors that he was looking for to come to the front.

 

[beervoid]

Hello Roadkizzle, thanks for your interesting post.
I will have a look at that book you mentioned seems like a very interesting read!

Edit. Is the book you talk about called "For the love of hops" ?

 

[PADave]

Hello Roadkizzle, thanks for your interesting post.
I will have a look at that book you mentioned seems like a very interesting read!

Edit. Is the book you talk about called "For the love of hops" ?

Yes, very good read. So many things go on with hops when brewing, a lot of which they don't know. I'd have to disagree with your brewer friend, you need more than 4 different hops to make all beer styles.