dry hop with hop tea

[Arbe0]

if I want to dryhop without putting actual hops into the fermenter (trying to keep hop material out of the glass carboy fermenter which has a small hole and hard to get the hop bag out.) can i just make a hop tea and put the tea in the carboy?

 

[Snuffy]

Yes, you can. Will it have the same effect as dry hopping? No. Dry hopping at ferm temp is for aroma mostly. Boiling hops is more for bittering. i have used hop tea exactly twice. Both times with lacto sours to halt the bacteria. I then dry hopped as well. Bitterness was negligible both times. First time I steeped in boiling water until room temp. Second time I actually boiled them for an hour and then cooled them rapidly. The sour may mask the bitter to a certain extent, but it was not hoppy either time.

Its a pain to fish the bag out of a carboy, but I would work them in with a hop sock and then fish out the gob after rinsing out the sludge.
and then there’s this:
https://www.homebrewing.org/Carboy-Dry-Hopping-Tube-400-Micron_p_7117.html

 

[tyrub42]

I used hop tea for aroma years ago when I was brewing at a friend's mountain house (he refused to make a trip up there to dry hop so I had to improvise). I steeped at whirlpool temp for maybe 20-30min (it was literally my third batch of beer ever so years ago and tough to remember exactly).

Did it add some decent flavor and aroma? Yes!

Was it as good as dry hopping? No.

Was it somewhat comparable to dry hopping? There will be some disagreement on this but I'd say no. It added pretty little aroma but did help the flavor a lot. Better than nothing but not a great substitute IMO. Could you just add the dry hops loose so it's easier to clean them out of the carboy?

Otherwise if it's hop tea or nothing then definitely do it. Just be sanitary and expect the hops to expand A LOT more than you expect (1 standard french press with maybe 1-1.5oz tops)

 

[Miraculix]

Wouldn't the French press technique be a nice way on focusing the effect on the piny parts of hop flavour? I always wanted to brew a super piny pale ale but I never succeeded. Tried all the candidates, Chinook, Simcoe, ctz..... I made good beer but it wasn't piny.

Maybe skipping the dry hop and using an excessive amount of medium hot hop tea would do the trick? The most volatile compounds will be driven of, the floral and fruity parts, and the piny goodness stays.

Does that make sense?

 

[tyrub42]

Wouldn't the French press technique be a nice way on focusing the effect on the piny parts of hop flavour? I always wanted to brew a super piny pale ale but I never succeeded. Tried all the candidates, Chinook, Simcoe, ctz..... I made good beer but it wasn't piny.

Maybe skipping the dry hop and using an excessive amount of medium hot hop tea would do the trick? The most volatile compounds will be driven of, the floral and fruity parts, and the piny goodness stays.

Does that make sense?

That makes sense on paper but I have no idea if it would work, or if it would work better than a traditional whirlpool.

Some suggestions for you for a nice piney beer from my experience would be a combo of chinook, columbus, and some centennial and also to use some darker malts (some light or medium crystal, etc) although I don't know if that directly helps the pine flavor or just matches it well.

Other suggestion would be to find ballast point big eye clone recipes. That beer is super piney in the best ways.

I've never really gotten what I consider pine out of Simcoe. I see what people are talking about but I get that more as a dank, musty forest fruit flavor. It makes me wonder if some people just don't register the same flavors as 'pine' due to their palates. No idea, but either way hopefully those suggestions are of some help. I definitely like to dry hop for more of that mouth-coating oily feel that accentuates the pine for me

 

[Broothru]

I have to agree with all the above comments. In the past 3~4 years I've tried numerous work-arounds trying to avoid opening the fermenter to dry hop. I've used hop teas, hop tinctures, and even tried distilled hop oil (El Dorado) which was a total boondoggle. Each, except the hop oil, 'worked' but were all poor substitutes for actual dry hopping.

The only thing I haven't tried is putting a Randalizer between the fermenter and the serving keg while packaging, but the limited contact time seems like it would be a waste of good hops. All considered, I'd rather have less hop aroma than more oxygen, if that's the choice.

What I have been doing is putting more emphasis on whirlpool hopping, and limiting the temperature to 170F for about :20 minutes. I prefer to use Cryo hops for this hopstand, but there are so few to choose from. Citra and Amarillo are my go-to's with Cascade as a back up, but anything else means using standard T90s, and more vegetation in the steep, which I'm trying to avoid. Still, it beats oxygenation.

Brooo Brother

 

[gencinjay]

I prefer to use Cryo hops for this hopstand, but there are so few to choose from.

Yakima has added a few more to their Lupomax line. May want to check them out again if you haven't lately. I think they have 9 or 10 in total now.

 

[Broothru]

I've been meaning to try Lupomax. I didn't realize that had that many varietals out there.

 

[tyrub42]

I've been meaning to try Lupomax. I didn't realize that had that many varietals out there.

There are a ton of cryo hops out now as well. Sabro, Simcoe, idaho 7, centennial, columbus, Mosaic, and others. I also like cryo for the whirlpool for sure.

That said if you want to dry hop without the o2 risk, just doing it before terminal gravity should do the trick. Could even consider a traditional dry hop with a light sugar addition. I have an NEIPA going now and will add dextrose with my second dry hop. We'll see how it works I guess .

Btw I also tried that hop oil. I had substantial results from it but it didn't really taste like el dorado, it was just a general hoppiness. I didn't hate it but didn't like it enough to do it again

 

[Broothru]

Yeah, that's what I meant by 'boondoggle.' It worked insofar as making the beer bitter, but it didn't add anything remotely like El Dorado.

I don't brew NEIPAs so a crap ton of DH is not part of my wheelhouse. That said, there are times when an IPA, APA, or even sometimes a lager can benefit from DH. Adding hops to the fermenter with a few points left before FG is a way to mitigate O2 incursion, that's true, but I've been able to adjust the whirpool hops enough to avoid oxidation risks inherent in DH.

You've got me psyched about all these new cryo hops. I hope the trends of producers continues to expand the varietals offered in cryo. The virtual cost is nearly a wash: the actual price is twice as high but you only use half as much. Keeping as much vegetation as I can out of the boil vessel and especially the fermenter is (to me) secondary only to keeping the oxygen out.

Brooo Brother

 

[tyrub42]

Yeah, that's what I meant by 'boondoggle.' It worked insofar as making the beer bitter, but it didn't add anything remotely like El Dorado.

I don't brew NEIPAs so a crap ton of DH is not part of my wheelhouse. That said, there are times when an IPA, APA, or even sometimes a lager can benefit from DH. Adding hops to the fermenter with a few points left before FG is a way to mitigate O2 incursion, that's true, but I've been able to adjust the whirpool hops enough to avoid oxidation risks inherent in DH.

You've got me psyched about all these new cryo hops. I hope the trends of producers continues to expand the varietals offered in cryo. The virtual cost is nearly a wash: the actual price is twice as high but you only use half as much. Keeping as much vegetation as I can out of the boil vessel and especially the fermenter is (to me) secondary only to keeping the oxygen out.

Brooo Brother

Agree, cryo is so user friendly. Wish they sold it in weight at better prices, but great to see so many varieties out there. Haven't tried lupomax yet (ordered a lb of citra lupo but got regular Citra by mistake...hard to complain though as it's super fresh citra haha), but hope to in the future. Wondering how it compares to cryo. Seems like you add 2/3 the amount instead of 1/2 but if everything else is the same that's easy and lupomax is nicely priced. We'll see

 

[Miraculix]

Whatever i did, i never got close to what I get from dry hop additions with flame out additions ... Maybe my temperature was too high?

In my case, the trade off between superior flavour and aroma from dry hopping with a little oxygen ingress is still so small that dry hopping beats whirlpool and flame out easily.

Nowadays I mostly do two additions, bittering and dry hooping.

 

[Taket_al_Tauro]

Whatever i did, i never got close to what I get from dry hop additions with flame out additions ... Maybe my temperature was too high?

I don't think you did anything wrong. I believe there is a large consensus by now that there is no way you are going to get even close to
the character imparted by dry hopping when doing only hot-side attitions, no matter how big you go and at what temperature.
I'm personally still doing substantial late hot-side additions in hoppy beers, but I see those definitely more as complementary to the real star of the show...the dry hops.

 

[Broothru]

I don't think you did anything wrong. I believe there is a large consensus by now that there is no way you are going to get even close to
the character imparted by dry hopping when doing only hot-side attitions, no matter how big you go and at what temperature.
I'm personally still doing substantial late hot-side additions in hoppy beers, but I see those definitely more as complementary to the real star of the show...the dry hops.

I think you're observations are correct, but think they apply mostly to dry hopping of NEIPAs. Probably involves biotransformation as well in the presence of active yeast.

I have found that lowering the temperature of my hopstand from knockout to around 170F has helped balance the equation from isomerization to aroma. Since I don't brew NEIPAs I haven't missed the hazy hop load, but I have avoided the majority of oxidative stresses.

Brooo Brother

 

[madscientist451]

if I want to dryhop without putting actual hops into the fermenter (trying to keep hop material out of the glass carboy fermenter which has a small hole and hard to get the hop bag out.) can i just make a hop tea and put the tea in the carboy?

Use a dry hop tube instead of hop bags?

https://www.homebrewing.org/Dry-Hop...Yqwkdntrv6Nt2wu6bibE4WyV2D8-CyehoCXiAQAvD_BwE

 

[Taket_al_Tauro]

I think you're observations are correct, but think they apply mostly to dry hopping of NEIPAs. Probably involves biotransformation as well in the presence of active yeast.

I have found that lowering the temperature of my hopstand from knockout to around 170F has helped balance the equation from isomerization to aroma. Since I don't brew NEIPAs I haven't missed the hazy hop load, but I have avoided the majority of oxidative stresses.

Brooo Brother

Yes I was primarily referring to very hop forward styles, NEIPA of course but also west coast IPA. Also for a modern WCIPA I do not think you are going to get anywhere near the hop character you want without a dry hopping step.
But I fully agree with you that for more subtle, less heavily hopped styles, late hot side additions alone can do wonders.