Heineken
Well-Known Member
I just read yoopers smell my fingers post and among other things, it made me wonder how you can detrmine AA% when you grow ur own hops. I am considering growing some next year so was just curious.
I just read yoopers smell my fingers post...
HAHA!!!! IMO this has nothing to do with hops...
I think the concensus is that you have to send some hops away to a lab for analysis...
I would suggest making a tea with a known amount of your hops, as well as with a known amount of a hop with a known AA and compare. It's not exact, but it'll get you in the ballpark. I've heard the palate can only decipher IBU differences of greater than 5, so there's some intrinsic wiggle-room when it comes to how much AA your hops have when you use them anyway.
The simplest way is to not bother. Use a typical value for the hop and you'll be close. If exact numbers are important, you have two choices: lab tests or not using the hops to bitter.
What he said.
I've used my home grown hops to bitter. The first batch wasn't quite bitter enough, i adjusted the % downward a bit and the next batch was spot on.
Yup, lab... that is the only way an average HBer will get this figured out.
not sure about titration...you can use uv/vis, hplc, and im sure gc mass spec though I dont know the method for gc mass spec. http://www.realbeer.com/hops/ASBC.html you can check out the first two methods there. Gonna need to get your hands on some toluene or diethyl ether, both of which can be nasty stuff. We stock both in our research lab so access here is not issue but if you do not have access to them they may be your limiting factor.
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