Dry Hopping

[d37fan]

The recipe calls for dry hopping in the secondary, and I was afraid the pellets would expand and make it tough getting the bag out of the carboy neck, so I just dumped them in loose. Most of the residue settled to the bottom, with a gentle rocking every other day, but there is a slight scum of hops on the top. How wrong was it to do this, and how should I do it next time? It has been in the secondary for 7 days now. Thanks for your input.
Dale

 

[landis]

When I dry hop I throw the pellets in just like you did - a lot easier I think than trying to deal with removing a hydrated hop bag.

I usually let the hops settle as much as possible and siphon around the residue.

 

[Zeno]

I just tossed my hops in the secondary. The hops settled and the beer looked very clean when racked to the bottling bucket.

No need for a bag.

 

[McKBrew]

When you rack your beer out of secondary attach a paint strainer around the end of the racking cane. This will act as a filter to keep out much of the hop residue.

 

[d37fan]

Will do that, Thanks.

 

[hopsalot]

I wrap a cheese cloth around the racking cane, same difference. I heard you are supposed to let the hops be and not induce settling, "top hop". Master Jedi's am I wrong?

 

[SeldomSeen]

I was worried about this myself.

This morning, I removed my hop bag from the primary carboy.
After I got the beer out of the primary, I filled the carboy with about 1.25 gallons of water to rinse and the when I dumped the rinse water, the hop bag came out the neck.
No big deal.

 

[thedude123]

I use a hop bag because I want to do 2 dry hops. I do one for 7 days then take the hops out and put new ones in for another 7 days.

If you use leaf hops when you do this you can keep them and use them for bittering hops in the next batch. I would do that batch the same day that you take them out of the carboy though.