Another Dry Hopping Question

[bigivybrew]

Ok, so I am brewing a pale ale (extract) and used 6 lbs LME and 3 lbs DME- opposed to my normal 6 lb, 1 1 lb recipes. I wanted to try something with a little higher ABV this go round. I used 1 oz. amarillo at start of boil, 1 oz. amarillo halfway, and finished with 1 oz cascade.

My fear is that the beer might end up being to sweet. I am shooting for a strong bitter with floral finish. I have always acheived that with this hop schedule, but have never used this much extract.

I am now considering dry hopping the beer in the secondary fermenter. However, I have never dry hopped before. So, 2 questions. 1. Do I even need to worry about dry hopping, or will the beer be bitter enough. 2. If I dry hop do I go with an oz. of amarillo, cascade, or something else all together?

 

[ScottSingleton]

dry hopping isn't going to affect the bitterness of your beer. That was determined during the boil. What dry hopping will do is add that initial nose you get when you pour the beer and bring it up to your face.

I would still dry hop because that aroma definitely helps the sensory impact you get from your beer and I'm a big fan. Personally I love Amarillo and would maybe go with 1.5 oz of Amarillo and .5 oz of Cascasce. But dude it's all up to you. If you're not happy with how it turns out tweak it a bit and try again

 

[kasky99]

Ok, so I am brewing a pale ale (extract) and used 6 lbs LME and 3 lbs DME- opposed to my normal 6 lb, 1 1 lb recipes. I wanted to try something with a little higher ABV this go round. I used 1 oz. amarillo at start of boil, 1 oz. amarillo halfway, and finished with 1 oz cascade.

My fear is that the beer might end up being to sweet. I am shooting for a strong bitter with floral finish. I have always acheived that with this hop schedule, but have never used this much extract.

I am now considering dry hopping the beer in the secondary fermenter. However, I have never dry hopped before. So, 2 questions. 1. Do I even need to worry about dry hopping, or will the beer be bitter enough. 2. If I dry hop do I go with an oz. of amarillo, cascade, or something else all together?

Yeah, like he said, dry hopping won't help. I have heard of people boiling hops in a small amount of water and adding the water to the fermenter before too, so there is always that. If you are trying to add more fermentables you will have to add more hops to achieve the same level of bitterness. I would suggest using beersmith when altering recipies, it has saved my a$$ more than a couple of times.

 

[dwarven_stout]

My fear is that the beer might end up being to sweet. I am shooting for a strong bitter with floral finish. I have always acheived that with this hop schedule, but have never used this much extract.

Dry hopping may add a little bitterness depending on the hops, but it's nothing like boiling the hops gives. You also have the option of making a hop tea and adding it to taste to bring up the bitterness a little.

 

[Andrew5329]

I've never dry hopped myself, but before you go and prepare the time/effort, before you rack to your secondary do a taste test. Just remember that as the sugar gets fermented the bitterness will be more present in your taste.

Dont be in too much of a rush to rack it into the secondary either, time is your friend and there's no particular rush to get it out of the primary, particularly with a high ABV brew.

Though if after a taste testing your on the fence whether to hop or not, I wouldn't do it, if only because a lightly hopped and somewhat sweet beer is a lot more drinkable/pleasant than an over-hopped beer where bitterness overpowers all the other flavors.

If I might ask, what was the initial gravity of the Brew before you started fermentation?

 

[ChadChaney]

Think about adjusting you bittering hops a bit to get a bit more bitterness, maybe start with something like warrior for bittering and adding the flavor and aroma hops late(bursting) for that nose and flavor. If you have beersmith, you can use the adjust bitterness tab to get where you want. Later the addition= less bitter more flavor/aroma. 2 pennies..

 

[jerryboy]

Drink your hydrometer samples and make your call from that. If you have the space, you could dry hop half and not the other to compare them.

 

[bigivybrew]

Thanks for the feedback. My OG was 1.050. Which was less than what I was shooting for, but it's okay.

I think I might try the dry hopping this time just for fun. It sounds like it might go good with this particular brew.