Didn't realize whole hops were such a nightmare...

Saturday was definitely my most stressful and frustrating brew session to date. All in all, though I can't really complain, as I haven't had but one or two other sessions that were at all stressful.

When picking up the supplies, my LHBS was out of Citra pellets, but had whole hops. I don't have a false bottom in my keggle, so I rack to the primary with a racking cane. I knew there would be issues with this clogging, but I was stupid enough to think "how bad could it really be?" I can't emphasize how stupid that was...

So everything was going fine, except for forgetting to do a FWH and add yeast nutrient. No big deal. After the boil, I cooled as normal, then went to rack into the primary. I immediately ran into clogging issues, and would rack some, get a clog, unclog, and rack some more. This was extremely tedious and wasn't really working.. About half way through, I BROKE the cane!! *facepalm* This is where it got incredibly frustrating. I tried to think of how in the world I would get the wort from the keggle into the carboy.

I ended up trying many different ways, like creating a siphon using a larger hose filled with sanitized water, dropping a muslin bag into the wort and scooping wort out from inside the bag, and a number of other ways, but everything I used would end up getting clogged, or just not work. At the end of the day the only thing I found that actually worked was to scoop up the wort in a large pyrex measuring cup and dump it back into the keggle through the muslin bag to remove the hops. I then was able to siphon it all into the carboy, but only after having to squeeze a ton of the wort through the bag with my hands.

I would be extremely surprised if I didn't end up with an infection or oxygenation issue, in fact, I'm pretty much betting on both. I was incredibly meticulous about sanitizing absolutely everything that touched the wort, but with how much my hands were in it, I'm not sure if there's any way around it. We'll see...

I will definitely be using a hop bag or some sort of strainer IF I ever use whole hops again. But that probably won't happen before I get a false bottom on the keggle.

That's a bummer. I think most of us have had a "fun" experience with whole hops before. I'd be willing to bet this batch turns out just fine.

Good news is, you have options for how to manage whole hops in the future. Here's a few:

1) Use a hop bag. So easy.
2) Float free in kettle, but pour into bucket lined w/5g strainer bag...lift out bag, squeeze gently, done. Might be too heavy to lift & pour from a keggle though, haha
3) Use a sanitized stainless strainer and scoop out bulk of the hops, then siphon. Much less clogging
4) Long whirlpool

You want to aerate the wort prior to pitching and I'll bet your beer isn't infected at all.
I have used bags and knee high pantyhose for leaf hops in the past but found it much easier to just toss 'em in the wort. I have a 1/2" side pick-up dip tube without a false bottom, large enough that some leaf material gets sucked up without causing a clog. Have you tried whirlpooling? or perhaps a larger diameter racking cane. I generally use pellets because I buy in bulk and they take up less room in my freezer but like using leaf too

TyTanium said:

That's a bummer. I think most of us have had a "fun" experience with whole hops before. I'd be willing to bet this batch turns out just fine.

Good news is, you have options for how to manage whole hops in the future. Here's a few:

1) Use a hop bag. So easy.
2) Float free in kettle, but pour into bucket lined w/5g strainer bag...lift out bag, squeeze gently, done. Might be too heavy to lift & pour from a keggle though, haha
3) Use a sanitized stainless strainer and scoop out bulk of the hops, then siphon. Much less clogging
4) Long whirlpool

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I definitely considered pouring into a bucket, but between the weight of the keg and the lip around the top, I knew it wouldn't work too well. Although I just realized reading your post that I have a small SS strainer that I could have used and it would have worked perfectly to scoop out the hops. Wish I had thought of that last night! Oh well, fermentation looks pretty good so far, so we'll see.

You can also try a SS scrubbing pad over the end of your cane, the kind for scrubbing pots. They come in a multipack so if it becomes clogged, swap for a fresh one.

I would be extremely surprised if I didn't end up with an infection or oxygenation issue

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I highly doubt oxygenation will be an issue. You really don't have to worry about that until after fermentation starts.

Hate that you had such a hard time, but relax. You didn't cause oxidation - your beer NEEDS oxygen prior to fermentation. Once fermentation is done, oxygen will stale it, but that's not what you had here.

you can also put a hop bag over the end of your racking cane. Works well.

I hear you. I personally can't stand whole hops and will NEVER pay for them. I'll use them if they're given to me or if I harvest them from my own plant but I won't pay for them.

Whole hops are the reason pellets were invented. LOL

Oh, I had the EXACT same experience a couple months ago with my homegrown hops, so I really sympathize. My situation had an extra dose of "Doh!", because I had purchased a bazooka screen for that exact purpose, then forgot to hook it up. I think my pellet/leaf combo would have clogged the bazooka anyway. For what it's worth, we started drinking that beer a few days ago and it came out fine, suprisingly! But from now on my leaf hops will only be used for dry hopping.

Two words: Hop spider

Update on this batch:

There doesn't seem to be any infection that I can tell, I transferred and dry hopped last weekend and will be bottling on Saturday. The primary did smell a little off, more pungent than usual, but the beer tasted fine, no sourness or funk that I could tell.

I may need to drink this one a little more quickly just to be safe, though. Oh darn.

I use a BIAB type bag for my whole hops. Can't imagine why that isn't standard practice. I use exclusively whole hops and don't have any issues. Life is good. If my hop utilization is a little lower that's okay because my bloop pressure is a little lower too, so I feel like I'm ahead of the game.

Glad our local brew shops starter kit comes with a big stainless steel strainer with legs that fit over a standard 5-8 gallon bucket.
Just set it on top, and dump all my wort from the BK into the fermenter. It can hold about 3-4oz of wet hops before it starts to get too full or heavy to worry me.

Also has an added effect of aerating the hell out of the wort.

Yeah, I didn't realize until about an hour after that I have a strainer that's the perfect size for scooping the hops out of the kettle. I was even more pissed after.

dbennett78 said:

Two words: Hop spider

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Two more words: Hop Spider

FuzzeWuzze said:

Glad our local brew shops starter kit comes with a big stainless steel strainer with legs that fit over a standard 5-8 gallon bucket.
Just set it on top, and dump all my wort from the BK into the fermenter. It can hold about 3-4oz of wet hops before it starts to get too full or heavy to worry me.

Also has an added effect of aerating the hell out of the wort.

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I've been using afine mesh strainer I got from midwest in the same way. Less trub & more aeration.

Since I BIAB as well- after I dump the spent grains, I rinse the bag (it is a large one). Then I use it like a trash can liner on my bottling bucket, dump in my chilled wort and remove the bag. The bag is squeezed (star-sanned hands!) to get out all of the beery goodness- and can then transfer to primary. It works equally well for pelletized hops.

This worked flawlessly for me both times i used it
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f14/best-racking-cane-filter-ever-363471/

It's all what you've setup your system for. Those with a false bottom, whole cone hops rock. Those of us without, pellets work better.

Personally, I would totally use whole cone if they didn't take up so much damn space in the freezer. I buy all my hops for the entire year in Oct/Nov (12lbs or so), so there's no way I could go whole cone without a dedicated freezer.

To me all-grain means all natural ingredients, so in essence, all-grain and all-cone. I don't know exactly what it is but IMO, pellets taste too perfect, kind of like jiffy peanut butter vs. real peanut butter -- it's a stretch I know but you get the point. Seriously though, just build a hop spider:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f51/hop-spider-cheap-207803/

And if you are brewing a really big, hoppy beer, just pull the bag out at FO and attach another.

I just use the old kitchen strainer and it works great. I find the real problem with whole hops is storing them. They just seem to age way to quickly.

seanybubbles said:

I just use the old kitchen strainer and it works great. I find the real problem with whole hops is storing them. They just seem to age way to quickly.

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That's what I thought this thread was going to be about. I really don't want to have to buy a dedicated freezer for them.

dbennett78 said:

Two words: Hop spider

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I'm going to make one.
Using bags for your hops sounds good, but after two or three hop additions that's a lot of bags.
A hop spider sounds like the perfect solution to a lot of mess.