Double IPA mess

[duskb]

I kegged a DIPA a couple of weeks ago and I had quite a difficult time racking in between the trub and the dry hop mess all over the top. I managed to get everything in there but apparently a lot of hops went in with it, so much so that it clogged the out tube and made the beer untapable.

In a moment of desperation I decided to take advantage of the last two weeks of settling and carbing that I figured I could rack the beer off of the hop cake from one keg to the next so I could get this beer going. As I was doing it I realized this broke rule number 1 of kegging which is you never let a conditioned beer to touch oxygen otherwise the beer will oxidize. Of course at this point I was hosed (literally) because I was syphoning from one keg to the next.

So, based on experience how screwed is the beer and more importantly how does one work around a stuck keg without oxidizing the whole batch? It seems like once you're in there you are in there....with no way out for better or worse.

 

[shortyz]

if your gonna drink the beer quickly(which an ipa should be), i would pour it through a sieve to get all the crap out. with an IPA if your drinking it within a few weeks oxidation shouldnt really be a concern.

 

[CA_Mouse]

Oxidation will only matter if you are planning on storing it for a few weeks instead of drinking it. I wouldn't worry about it, since it is an IPA.

 

[beerkench]

If you don't cold crash you can try adding hops during the back end of fermentation and rousing the carboy slightly so that the hop matter dissolves. That way they are small enough to pass through if some hops do get transferred over.


Sent from hell
using Home Brew

 

[dkennedy]

Did you purge the receiving keg? That's about the only step that you maybe could've done differently, otherwise it sounds like you adapted the best you could.
I need to have "put a bag over your racking cane" tattooed on my arm...never remember until it's one gurgle too late.

 

[duskb]

Did you purge the receiving keg? That's about the only step that you maybe could've done differently, otherwise it sounds like you adapted the best you could.
I need to have "put a bag over your racking cane" tattooed on my arm...never remember until it's one gurgle too late.

I used my cane so the top was open to the air the whole time, hence my realization. I suppose I could have hit the empty with some CO2 prior to taking the lid off just to push out as much oxygen as possible, but I didn't think about that. It was pretty foamy too.

I drew off some last night after the foaming stopped and it seemed to taste ok. There are still alot of hop flakes floating around in suspension. This is not the cleanest beer I've done before but I'm not going to risk trying to filter/clean it further. I'll just live with it as is and know for next time to transfer dry hopped beer to a secondary clarifying stage before crash cooling.

 

[dkennedy]

If you carb'd in the initial keg, then that probably helped drive off some of the O2 as well, didn't think of that earlier. Wouldn't sweat it too much, but wouldn't let it hang out for too long either (seldom an issue for my IPA's though). In the future, might try bagging your hops, and/or slipping a tight-mesh bag over your cane when transferring to keg.