Brewing 6 SMaSH variations simultaneously?

[npbrew]

Hey all, I have been itching to get a good handle on a number of different hops, especially their effect as late additions.

I really like the concept of a SMaSH to experiment with hop character and get my bearings, but not really willing to sacrifice that many precious brew days to make a load of SMaSH IPA's that may or may not be good.

So... could I just brew them all at once? Here's my idea:

- Brew up a 6 gal batch of plain ol' 2-row
- Add a neutral bittering addition to the boil at 60m (hops extract maybe?)
- At flameout, separate the near boiling wort into 6 *separate* 1 gallon jugs, and adding a charge of different hops to each jug, say 1 oz, and swirl
- Cool it all down in a giant kiddie-pool ice bath
- ?? Transfer into other jugs to separate from break material (is this even necessary?)
- Pitch some US-05 and ferment my newly-concieved sextuplet SMaSH family

Has anyone done something like this before? More importantly is it a completely disastrous idea? Any input or suggestions would be appreciated

 

[peterj]

Yeah, that's a great idea! I never thought about doing that, but it makes complete sense because for a lot of my IPAs I add all of my flavor/aroma hops at flameout anyway.

I would suggest doing a whirlpool/hopstand for about 30 minutes before you start cooling the jugs off.

Also, make sure the jugs you transfer the hot wort to can handle the heat. I feel like glass might crack and plastic might melt. Maybe look into what no chill brewers use for their wort. Or you could use a bunch of pots if you have them.

And I wouldn't worry about the break material or trub. A lot of people (including me lately) just dump all of it into the fermenter. I've actually read that it might result in clearer beer that way.

Definitely let us know how it turns out! I might even try doing this myself at some point.

 

[Near-Beer-Engineer]

I think that's a great idea and one I've been considering myself! The above poster made a lot of good points, +1 to that.

You could consider splitting the boil in what ever proportion you want as well and doing the smaller one on the stove to experiment with FWH or different flavour additions. Shouldn't as much time to your brew day but you will have one more pot to clean...

Definitely report back on your findings!


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

 

[npbrew]

Awesome, thanks for the feedback all! Good point about the hot wort in glass jugs - I might preheat them in a 200 degree oven to get them at temp (and possibly sanitize them as well - bonus!) and hope they do not explode in my oven. Glad to hear that there is no need to fear the trub, as the stuff creeps me out.

I'll be doing a brew in a few days, so hopefully I will have something to report back on soon. I'll try to throw together a base recipe to work with in the meantime. Oh, and find more jugs...

 

[ChefRex]

If you're using a bittering hop and finishing with another your not making a Smash but regardless a cool experiment.
Don't fear the trub, My frugal German heritage won't let me toss the break, hop, wort in the bottom of the pot, I often throw it in a gallon jug and add what ever yeast I have available that I have harvested and see what happens, some times it comes out really good, cost me nothing but a little time.

 

[MikeInMKE]

This is how New Glarus does it:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f13/how-do-small-test-batches-394905/index2.html#post5014575

 

[Crucial-BBQ]

Hey all, I have been itching to get a good handle on a number of different hops, especially their effect as late additions.

I really like the concept of a SMaSH to experiment with hop character and get my bearings, but not really willing to sacrifice that many precious brew days to make a load of SMaSH IPA's that may or may not be good.

So... could I just brew them all at once? Here's my idea:

- Brew up a 6 gal batch of plain ol' 2-row
- Add a neutral bittering addition to the boil at 60m (hops extract maybe?)
- At flameout, separate the near boiling wort into 6 *separate* 1 gallon jugs, and adding a charge of different hops to each jug, say 1 oz, and swirl
- Cool it all down in a giant kiddie-pool ice bath
- ?? Transfer into other jugs to separate from break material (is this even necessary?)
- Pitch some US-05 and ferment my newly-concieved sextuplet SMaSH family

Has anyone done something like this before? More importantly is it a completely disastrous idea? Any input or suggestions would be appreciated

I agree with the other poster that you are not doing SMaSH if you use a bittering treatment on the initial 6 gallon batch.

Beer is a highly subjective and personal experience. Experimenting is the only way to figure out what you like and what you don't. For what it is worth, if you are not willing to "lose a few batches" or to sacrifice brew days the quality of your beer may never reach its full potential...or even come close.

Awesome, thanks for the feedback all! Good point about the hot wort in glass jugs - I might preheat them in a 200 degree oven to get them at temp (and possibly sanitize them as well - bonus!) and hope they do not explode in my oven. Glad to hear that there is no need to fear the trub, as the stuff creeps me out.

I'll be doing a brew in a few days, so hopefully I will have something to report back on soon. I'll try to throw together a base recipe to work with in the meantime. Oh, and find more jugs...

Rapidly cooling hot glassware can also cause it to break/shatter, such as removing a hot piece of glassware from the oven and placing it on a cold (room temp) granite counter top. Lab ware, such as the Erlenmeyer flasks in the New Glarus link above are made of borosilicate glass, which are designed to be heated-sometimes to extreme temps.

For what it is worth I would use Erlenmyer flasks, but I would not purchase those from an LHBS as you will end up paying at least twice as much for them. Practically every city has a "science supply store" and there is always the Internet.


Trub is your friend. If you want you can strain it and use the liquid for a yeast starter or for krausening.

 

[peterj]

I agree with the other poster that you are not doing SMaSH if you use a bittering treatment on the initial 6 gallon batch.

It may not be a smash in the technical sense of the acronym, but it will absolutely give you the information you are looking for. I guess the only thing you won't get from doing it this way is the bittering profile of each hop. But that's not really the point, because usually people just use a neutral hop to bitter anyway. I almost always use Magnum or something similar. You're not going to bitter with something like Citra because it would be a waste of hops. So this seems like it would be an even more accurate way to see what each hop will contribute to the flavor/aroma in an actual batch.

Beer is a highly subjective and personal experience. Experimenting is the only way to figure out what you like and what you don't. For what it is worth, if you are not willing to "lose a few batches" or to sacrifice brew days the quality of your beer may never reach its full potential...or even come close.

This is just a more efficient way to experiment. How would wasting time, energy, and beer by separating out all of these brews into separate brew days make someone's beer any better or the experiments any more informative?

Rapidly cooling hot glassware can also cause it to break/shatter, such as removing a hot piece of glassware from the oven and placing it on a cold (room temp) granite counter top. Lab ware, such as the Erlenmeyer flasks in the New Glarus link above are made of borosilicate glass, which are designed to be heated-sometimes to extreme temps.

For what it is worth I would use Erlenmyer flasks, but I would not purchase those from an LHBS as you will end up paying at least twice as much for them. Practically every city has a "science supply store" and there is always the Internet.

This is very true. I agree that you probably just shouldn't use glass at all, pre-heated or not. If you can afford it/find a good deal I think Erlenmeyer flasks would be the best way to go. If not I would just separate them into pots, let them cool in those, and then transfer them to the fermenters. You could even have the hop additions already in the bottom of each pot/flask before you add the hot wort.

 

[Crucial-BBQ]

It may not be a smash in the technical sense of the acronym, but it will absolutely give you the information you are looking for. I guess the only thing you won't get from doing it this way is the bittering profile of each hop. But that's not really the point, because usually people just use a neutral hop to bitter anyway. I almost always use Magnum or something similar. You're not going to bitter with something like Citra because it would be a waste of hops. So this seems like it would be an even more accurate way to see what each hop will contribute to the flavor/aroma in an actual batch.

Most brewers use a hop variety with a high aa to reduce the amount of organic material left in kettle (trub) and for cost savings. To achieve a target IBU, a high aa hop varietal such as Citra would mean that less of the hop is required, and less hops means less organic vegetable matter in the kettle. If you were to use say Saaz, which is the noble bittering hop of choice for traditional Pilseners, you would need to use a larger amount of hops to achieve the same IBU. More hops means more vegetable matter...and more vegetable matter means more contribution to flavor and aroma from this very same vegetable matter. This is why Continental lagers can have their trademark hop flavor/aroma with only a single bittering addition of a low aa hop; and why American IPAs and APAs use higher aa bittering hops (to lessing the total amount of hops in the hot wort/trub...a smaller amount of bittering hops at 60 minutes reduces the amount of vegetable matter, reducing any flavor and aroma characteristics these hops may contribute, thus being easier to "hide" behind later additions of aroma/flavor hops).

Yes, if you are a typical American IPA lover (i.e., "West Coast" style IPA hop bombs) and simply want to see which hop varietal gives the most pronounced "hop explosion" to your face, any initial high aa bittering addition will do. However, if the point of the experiment to witness firsthand the different effects different hops lend to the brew an entire single addition is required. Otherwise a different taste could be produced if say the OP initially used a bittering addition of Magnum with an aa of 12% then decided to use Perle with an aa of 8% the next time around.

Two examples of this are with Anchor's Liberty Ale and Miller Fortune (as well as Miller Lite) all use one hop: Cascade. Anchor's California Lager also makes use of only one hop: the "hated why-would-you-ever-use-that-hop-because-Jamil-says-it-sucks, I'm gonna puke" Cluster. California Lager and Liberty Ale are true SMaSH beers; CL another example of how Jamil is wrong and why American home brewers should not be afraid of Cluster, and, LA, along with Miller Fortune, examples of how Cascade does not give the stereotypical aroma/flavor that most think it would because of the way Cascade is utilize in each respective beer.

Then there is also first-wort hopping.

Water chemistry, yeast strain, and grain bill also contribute, or reduce, hop utilization.

My intention is to not split hairs here and if I am wrong then I am wrong

My main concern is that the OP presents utilizing the hops in a way (essentially steeping all at "flameout") that would more-than-likely produce different results than the more traditional way (boiling additions). If the OP likes the results wouldn't s/he need to have a large, single, aroma/flavor addition at flameout in order to recreate the experimental results?

This is just a more efficient way to experiment. How would wasting time, energy, and beer by separating out all of these brews into separate brew days make someone's beer any better or the experiments any more informative?

I agree that completing all six batches in one setting is the most efficient use of time, but that is not what I meant. I am saying that as a brewer, home or otherwise, if you are not accepting of the fact every brew day is a potential "waste of time" than you are only going to cut yourself short. The reality is that when ever you try something new you are sacrificing your time for something that may not turn out as hoped.

In hindsight I now realize that my comment was not necessary in terms of responding to the OP.

 

[peterj]

Most brewers use a hop variety with a high aa to reduce the amount of organic material left in kettle (trub) and for cost savings. To achieve a target IBU, a high aa hop varietal such as Citra would mean that less of the hop is required, and less hops means less organic vegetable matter in the kettle. If you were to use say Saaz, which is the noble bittering hop of choice for traditional Pilseners, you would need to use a larger amount of hops to achieve the same IBU. More hops means more vegetable matter...and more vegetable matter means more contribution to flavor and aroma from this very same vegetable matter. This is why Continental lagers can have their trademark hop flavor/aroma with only a single bittering addition of a low aa hop; and why American IPAs and APAs use higher aa bittering hops (to lessing the total amount of hops in the hot wort/trub...a smaller amount of bittering hops at 60 minutes reduces the amount of vegetable matter, reducing any flavor and aroma characteristics these hops may contribute, thus being easier to "hide" behind later additions of aroma/flavor hops).

The OP is making smash IPAs so I wouldn't really think he is looking for the delicate subtle hop flavors you get from a large, low aa bittering addition. I meant using Citra to bitter an IPA is a waste of hops in that the flavor and aroma are the most sought after attributes of the hop and those will mostly be boiled away if it is used for bittering. And what's left will be covered up by later hop additions. I agree that if you're looking at something like a noble hop or East Kent Goldings or other hops that will be used in beers that rely on the bittering addition for some or all of the hop flavor, then doing a true smash with the hop in question being the bittering hop is the best idea. But the OP said he's wanting to make smash IPAs and "especially" looking at hops' "effect as late additions".

Then there is also first-wort hopping.

Just an off topic comment, but in my opinion first wort hopping is basically just an extended bittering addition. I've never noticed an appreciable difference in the quality of bittering.

My main concern is that the OP presents utilizing the hops in a way (essentially steeping all at "flameout") that would more-than-likely produce different results than the more traditional way (boiling additions). If the OP likes the results wouldn't s/he need to have a large, single, aroma/flavor addition at flameout in order to recreate the experimental results?

Hopstands/whirlpooling all of your flavor and aroma hops after flameout is a widely utilized and great technique for getting the most flavor and aroma out of your hops. I do it for many of the IPAs I brew, and I know of a lot of people who do the same. Many commercial breweries do this as well. Sierra Nevada and Heretic (sorry to mention Jamil's brewery, seems like there's a bit of a vendetta there ) are just 2 that come to mind. You just end up retaining more of the hop flavor and aroma because the oils are not volatilized and lost in the vigorous boil. You don't really get a much different type of flavor from it, just more of it which is what you want in a typical American IPA.

 

[wingedcoyote]

I did pretty much exactly what you describe back in January. Thread with a couple of pics here: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f13/sanity-check-my-multi-hop-experiment-454299/

I got some pretty tasty beers out of it, but they weren't as distinct from one another as I hoped. I think that has a lot to do with the fact that I messed up the temperatures, though -- my hop steep ended up taking place at about 120, much lower than I planned for. Also if I were to do it again I would use MOAR HOPS per batch (previously I did, I think, .3oz of each one). Also stick to pellets -- I used whole leaf for one batch and it didn't go well at all.

As far as results from my experiment, I did learn that I like Simcoe and Chinook as whirlpool hops way more than I expected -- both presented some nice fruit juicy characteristics, not piney or harsh like I expected. Cascade was very Cascade-y, and Centennial was the harshest of the lot. Amarillo was extremely mild, I think because that was the whole leaf batch and they did a lot of just floating on the top.

I did use glass jugs for my batches and had no problems with thermal shock. Granted this was with ~120 degree wort as mentioned.

 

[npbrew]

Thanks all for the great info, although I realize now that this is in no way a Smash - not sure how I came up with that

I am going more for the distinction between various late additions, as I am planning on crafting some hoppy IPA's and I only have solid experience with a few varieties such as Centennial (which I love BTW). I have also never whirlpooled either, so I am curious how different hops respond to whirlpool temperatures. I have noticed as well that some hops are great to some and repellent to others (such as Simcoe = cat pee) so I just want to get that out of the way before brewing with them. Why bother brewing a big batch of beer that I hate? Also using the same wort, fermentation temps, yeast etc. theoretically takes out a lot of variables that would otherwise interfere with a comparison.

I think I might FWH some Magnum that I have on hand to get ~ 50 IBU's for some nice, smooth bitterness to back up the hops and shoot for ~ 6% ABV. I was originally thinking around 1oz of pellets per jug, but that might be madness for a hop bomb like citra as previous posters mentioned, as that would be like throwing in 5oz hops in a whirlpool after flameout, which seems like a lot. I could scale the amount of hops relative to the AA% (Or Beta Acid??) content of each variety, but then I would lose some of the comparative value between varieties. Thoughts?

I did pretty much exactly what you describe back in January. Thread with a couple of pics here: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f13/sanity-check-my-multi-hop-experiment-454299/

Glad to know that this is not totally crazy! Also relieved to know that nothing exploded on you, although I am still nervous about it. Maybe cramming in more hops is not such a bad plan either.

I really love the idea of the New Glarus method, if only I had a big fancy gas stove... I might look into the borosilicate flasks though, as I have occasionally seen them sell for cheaper in bulk at lab supply locations. Not sure how SWMBO would feel about half a dozen erlenmeyer flasks taking up precious shelf space though

So sadly my brew plans were pushed back until next week, but this definitely gave me more to chew on. I might bounce some ideas of hops selection off you all. I am also thinking about using Maris Otter as the base malt instead of 2-row to mix things up a bit. Will keep you posted!

 

[Setesh]

Subscribed. I'm interested to see how this turns out.

 

[fredhead]

I've stewing on this idea for the past couple of weeks.

I'm wondering, if you use a huge amount of hops, can you get the aroma/flavor from dry hopping alone without any aroma/flavor hops at the end of the boil?

If yes, this would simplify things greatly:
Mash and boil simple 5.5 gal (20 liters) grainbill, pick a bittering hop with little flavor, skip any late addition hopping, cool with the chiller (no multiple ice baths!!!!), stir in the yeast, distribute into 12 2 liter soda bottles (1.75 liters each) , cap and shake, recap with a drilled whole and a tube for blowoff (save on the 12 airlocks), dryhop each bottle with a full oz of hops after a week.

Any thoughts?

I saw someone post about dry hopping 12 budweisers, dropping some hops in and recapping them. Anyone try this?

 

[grathan]

It's hard to get the soda flavor out of bottles unless you use something like seltzer.

Dry hopping is mostly aroma. The flavor added is sometimes grassy and bitter and also clouds the beer.


If you had a bunch of sauce pans you could transfer (if you had a spigot on the kettle and careful not to aerate ) boiling wort to separate pots containing unique hops. Then let this simmer until cool and transfer to soda jugs.

 

[peterj]

I'm wondering, if you use a huge amount of hops, can you get the aroma/flavor from dry hopping alone without any aroma/flavor hops at the end of the boil?

This would be a good idea if you just want to see how the hops act as dry hops, but it will not be the same as adding them to the boil and/or whirlpool. You get a much different flavor and aroma from adding hops to the boil or whirlpool than if you dry hop them.

 

[fredhead]

If you had a bunch of sauce pans you could transfer (if you had a spigot on the kettle and careful not to aerate ) boiling wort to separate pots containing unique hops. Then let this simmer until cool and transfer to soda jugs.

Excuse my ignorance, can you explain the negative impact of aeration at this point?

 

[peterj]

Excuse my ignorance, can you explain the negative impact of aeration at this point?

Google "Hot Side Aeration". I don't think it's something you really need to worry about too much on a homebrew scale, but I think minimizing aeration of hot wort (within reason) is a good practice. Excessively aerating hot wort can oxidize fatty acids which will stick around and lead to premature staling in the packaged beer. Here's a pretty good article I just found about it: https://byo.com/stories/item/861-hot-side-aeration--storing-hops-mr-wizard.

 

[markstache]

I saw someone post about dry hopping 12 budweisers, dropping some hops in and recapping them. Anyone try this?

I did it with Sam Adams Boston Lager (couldn't bring myself to buy BMC). I dropped one pellet into each bottle and recapped. A week later we sampled them. It was very informative, though my taste memory fades. I should do it again soon (and take detailed notes this time). It would be a fun thing to do on a brew day with some buddies or at a club meeting.

 

[thefost]

I've been in the planning stages of a similar experiment for the past week or two, so you are definitely not alone in this. I'll be using 1/2 gallon mason jars to ferment in. I may be venturing into crazy town though, as I'm probably going to make about 20-30 versions all using the same hop (probably cascade) and just changing the time and temperature of the addition. Just yesterday I made the worlds smallest immersion chiller that can fit in a mason jar =D

 

[shtoive87]

I did this with 6 types of hops (Amarillo, Fuggles, Kent Goldings, Hallertau, Tettnang, Saaz) and just did extract batches. I boiled each extract wort for 15 minutes with 0.5 oz of the specific hop, then put 0.5 oz an flameout. The flavor turned out great, and I found that I could distinguish between the different kinds of hops. If I had to do it again, I might do .25 oz at flameout and save the remaining .25 oz for dry hopping.

I used two pots and was able to boil one while another was cooling. All in all, it took about 3 hours.

 

[npbrew]

So, I ended up doing this, and finally have gotten a chance to post some results.

I went ahead and mashed 15 lbs of Maris Otter at 153, and hit it right at 1.060. The MO wort tasted awesome, with a nice biscuit undertone. I bittered with 1.2 oz of magnum at 60m for ~50 ibu's, although I probably should have used less, as it was good and bitter well before the hop stand.

While I was super nervous about breakage, I probably shouldn't have. I preheated 6 jugs with hot tap water, and poured in wort at about 170° with no problems - although there was always a towel underneath everything, especially my cool tile floors, to prevent any temperature fluctuations. 1 oz of hops went in each one, including
- Citra (last time I used it, it tasted rank, so gonna give it another try)
- Fuggles (seems like there is a lot of fuggles haters, so had to see for myself)
- Simcoe (same reason as Fuggles)
- Cascade (not sure why i chose this... base comparison?)
- Amarillo
- Mosaic
And yeah, I may have gone a bit overboard on the fruity hops here

The biggest problem was cooling everything down. After a good 20 mins of hanging out around 170, I kinda forgot about that part and ran myself out of time. I left them to air cool with a box fan, but I was not able to get them down to pitching temp until 8 hours later... which was not the plan. I should have just thrown them in the bathtub or something similar to get them down to temp, but did not have the forethought, and still had the paranoia of thermal shock after hearing a horror story at my LHBS.

So, that happened.

I really have no idea if they will be insanely bitter, or if I volatilized away all the aroma, and I have been afraid to take any samples so far because of it.

However, all the members of my little hoppy family are apparently happy fermenting away despite the incredible amount of hop sludge. I'll give an update when I finally gather the courage to taste a hydrometer sample.

 

[Near-Beer-Engineer]

Awesome, looking forward to hearing how they turn out!


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

 

[peterj]

Yeah me too! That looks great.

 

[npbrew]

To update, I took a taste of the Mosaic batch. When I first pulled it, it smelled like muddled fruit, and my heart sank for a moment. The aroma was not quite there, and it was probably because I skipped out on the dry hops (something I should probably do next time). My sense of smell is not awesome during the summer anyway due to allergies, so I can't really trust it much.

However, the taste was great. A bit more bitter than before the pre-whirlpool sample I think, but not overwhelmingly so. Got some strong citrus like lemon and grapefruit, tropical fruit, maybe lychee and and kiwi with a herbal hint. it was a big complex fruit basket. Mosaic FTW!

There was a little green apple and maybe some diacetyl, probably from pitching it too warm at ~75. I also fermented at higher than I normally do at 68. Hopefully that will fade while in the bottle.

It got down to 1.009 which was a lot higher attenuation than I expected, around 84%, even though I mashed a bit higher than usual
Ah well. I suppose the dryness brings out the hops a bit more anyway, which was the overall goal.

Despite the hiccups along the way, so far so good. Not looking forward to bottling time, will be a beast. Daydreaming about the chance to do a flight of these all together though