Accidental 4 month keg dry hop

[m00ps]

So I was in a very serious car accident back in January. I was hospitalized for 2 months, heart stopped on the operating table, rehab, blah blah blah. Anyway, my neighbors were worried about all the beer I had fermenting and dumped it, which was 4 5-gallon batches I was sadder about the beer than my broken bones.

The night before my accident I had just purged, kegged, pressurized and dry hopped my latest IPA using the dental floss/bag method and whole leaf hops and it survived the cleaning of my apartment. I'm glad to be back to brewing (and standing again) and I decided to give this brew a shot and see if it was drinkable.

When I vented off the keg mother of god did it smell good. I was worried about any stale, grassy, vegetal flavors from such a long contact time but holy s%&$tsnacks is it tasty.

So for any of you that are wondering, you cna totally leave keg hops in the keg as long as you wish without worrying about unwanted flavors. Just be sure they are whole leaf hops. I've heard some success stories with pellets, but also some not-so-successful

 

[JLeuck64]

That is really great news! All of it ( :

 

[SeeMont]

So happy about your recovery, you have been through a lot. Thanks for the info about dry hopping.

 

[cyberbrew]

First off, glad to hear you're doing better! Secondly, very cool for sticking with brewing and doubly cool that you have a tasty 4 month dry hopped IPA. Awesome stuff!!

 

[The10mmKid]

I'll be darn . . . . there IS a Silver Lining in every dark cloud.

Glad things are improving and Thank You for sharing,
'da Kid

 

[outside92129]

Welcome back! Good to hear the news about you and the dry hopping.

 

[m00ps]

Thanks!
Yeah all I could think of in the hospital was getting back to brewing. So boring being a single room for like 2 months...
I'm just glad my yeast bank survived. I've been in the process of "reviving" my stored yeasts in small 500ml starters to then store again

 

[jbord37]

Well done on the recovery and the brewing. I was thinking about something similar earlier watching videos on DFH website. They dry hop 120 for 30 days and age it another month on whole leaf.

I think lots of home brew taboos are a result of process mistakes and not actually forbidden (secondary fermentation, sitting on the yeast too long, etc).

Stay strong and hope you're at 110% before long.

 

[m00ps]

Random update - I was giving out homebrew at an arts festival right by my place and I stopped by a local radio both. This girl wanted to do a piece on me and they put it on the web. Apparently the story made it over to the UK somehow too, I'm guessing its cause of the title they gave the article: "Paducah Homebrewer Awakes from Coma Only to Worry About His Beer"

http://wkms.org/post/paducah-homebrewer-awakes-coma-only-worry-about-his-beer

http://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/weird-news/449237/Bryan-Canavan-homebrewer-coma-beer-home-brew-booze-Kentucky

 

[Hoppity]

In the Daily Star & rubbing elbows with royalty. Now that is a comeback!

 

[iijakii]

Why the hell did they dump it?

 

[m00ps]

My neighbors were getting rid of everything that would spoil in my fridge and then saw the fermentors. I guess its a bit my fault for not teaching them more about the whole fermentation process, but some of my friends figured the fermentors would keep building pressure and blow up. I had a 4month brett'd beer going too...

 

[DrunkleJon]

Thats it. You convinced me. I am going to write a document outlining what needs to be done should I be incapacitated for any reason. These instructions will include. If I have beer fermenting. Keep the blowoff jar/airlocks topped off. Feel free to sample the finished beer. Do not throw anything away. If I should pass on, give my equipment away to people on HBT.

I am glad to hear you have come out of it okay and that there was a silver lining. Though I am also sorry you had to go through the whole accident/recovery thing only to get your fermenting babies tossed too. Welcome back.

 

[m00ps]

Thats it. You convinced me. I am going to write a document outlining what needs to be done should I be incapacitated for any reason. These instructions will include. If I have beer fermenting. Keep the blowoff jar/airlocks topped off. Feel free to sample the finished beer. Do not throw anything away. If I should pass on, give my equipment away to people on HBT.

I am glad to hear you have come out of it okay and that there was a silver lining. Though I am also sorry you had to go through the whole accident/recovery thing only to get your fermenting babies tossed too. Welcome back.

Haha great idea - a legally binding homebrew will. "And my collection of aged stouts and strong belgians shall be bequeathed to my drunken friends. My collection of house yeast strains shall be disseminated among other local brewers and breweries. But my recipes will be buried with me"

 

[DrunkleJon]

Haha great idea - a legally binding homebrew will. "And my collection of aged stouts and strong belgians shall be bequeathed to my drunken friends. My collection of house yeast strains shall be disseminated among other local brewers and breweries. But my recipes will be buried with me"

Know any Homebrewing underwriters?