Drying hops--with an air filter sandwich :)

I have heard of people drying hops in their attic and other various ways, but my neighbor (non-brewer) was telling me a way that she does "cold-dried beef jerky". She takes two air conditioner filters (the white, fine-matted ones) and puts the meat between the filters and sets a box fan on top, facing down towards the sandwiched meats until dry.

Any reason this wouldn't work for drying hops?

 

That's how I dried my hops, except I had 4 layers on my sandwich

 

personally i used screens but i see no reason why that wouldnt work also. As long as theres good circulation of air your fine.

 

Alton Brown uses this method to dry herbs on "Good Eats" to good results... He actually bungees the filters to the fan so it remains standing, promoting better airflow. The only drawback would be having to keep loading up the filters when your plants start to produce into several lb. range...

 

I did that, and at the same time had a bunch layed out on cookie sheets with a fan blowing on them... the cookie sheet bunch dried more quickly.

 

Yup. I bungee'd four cheap furnace filters to a box spring with hops jammed in the middle. The "v" shape of the filters left plenty of room without crushing the hops too bad. Worked fine; 'bout a day, day and a half and they were plenty dry. Drove out all the aphids, too!

 

Back on topic.

I bought some cheap air filters at home depot and propped a long ladder up on both ends. Laid the screens over the ladder and put a small heater and fans underneat blowing up (didn't even cover the top of the hops). Had no problem drying out bunches of hops in about a half day.