Has anyone boiled hops for 60 mins and added the extract in the last 5 mins?

[Elysium]

I am wondering if good beer can be obtained (something that people would even believe to be a real all-grain craft brew) from the following idea:

-boil water for 60 mins to get the required acid from the hops
-add pale ale malt extract in the last five minutes
-chill and ferment

Has anyone ever done an extract brew with the above mentioned instructions?

 

[corycorycory09]

That would be an interesting experiment.

Your original gravity would be very low (1.00) so the hops would isomerize faster than in a normal wort.

 

[chickypad]

Search the brewing radio archives, those guys did an experiment just like this. As I recall they both actually preferred the end result beer that had the hops boiled just in water with all the extract added at the end. Debunks the idea that you need some malt in order to extract the bittering.

 

[dkevinb]

It's usually recommended to have at least a little malt extract in the boil. Boiling hops in plain water can give you some vegetative flavors. When I was doing extract batches I'd add a pound or two of the extract at the beginning of the boil, then the rest with maybe 15 minutes left in the boil. You can definitely make good beer that way.

 

[kh54s10]

I think you need some of the malt extract in the boil to isomerize the hops properly.

But as corycorycory09 stated it would be and interesting experiment.

 

[Yooper]

It's usually recommended to have at least a little malt extract in the boil. Boiling hops in plain water can give you some vegetative flavors. When I was doing extract batches I'd add a pound or two of the extract at the beginning of the boil, then the rest with maybe 15 minutes left in the boil. You can definitely make good beer that way.

That is my understanding- that the water-only boiled hops were extremely harsh and not altogether pleasant. I did not try this myself, but I would probably add, oh, a pound of extract per gallon of liquid boiled, more or less, and add the rest of the extract at flame out to avoid any harshness.

 

[unionrdr]

When I was still doing Cooper's brews, I tried hop teas a couple times for flavor additions. Since the Cooper's cans are pre-hopped you can't boil them without messing up the hop additions already in them. Not bad really. But adding some malt to the boil is better, in my opinion. But as always, it depends on what you wanna end up with.

 

[Tinpanharry]

Many have recommended to use half of the malts when boiling the hops, then add the other half of the malts about 10 minutes before the end of the boil. This works for me.

Woodland Brewing has also done some work in this area. He is a member here and has some interesting experiments on his website http://www.woodlandbrew.com/

 

[kh54s10]

I am wondering if good beer can be obtained (something that people would even believe to be a real all-grain craft brew) from the following idea:

-boil water for 60 mins to get the required acid from the hops
-add pale ale malt extract in the last five minutes
-chill and ferment

Has anyone ever done an extract brew with the above mentioned instructions?

If you use a good kit, good recipe, and good ingredients. Your extract batch should be just as good as an all grain beer.

The only thing I have noticed is it is difficult to get a very pale recipe to be as light in color when using extract.

 

[Elysium]

If you use a good kit, good recipe, and good ingredients. Your extract batch should be just as good as an all grain beer.

The only thing I have noticed is it is difficult to get a very pale recipe to be as light in color when using extract.

Thanks for the comment.
When do you add the extract to the boil?
I was told that a long boil causes the extract to turn darkish in colour.

That's why I only want to add it like in the last 5 mins or so.

 

[unionrdr]

Add about 1/3, or 1lb per gallon of water at the beginning for hop additions. Then the remainder at flame out for lighter color & cleaner flavor.

 

[IslandLizard]

pH may need to be monitored and adjusted during that hop boil. Brewing water has very little buffering capacity, unlike wort. I'm sure hop extraction and conversion is a complex science.

You still end up with an extract brew and its inherent limitations. Now if you partial-/mini-mashed or steeped, things may look better.

Alternatively:
For bittering you can use pre-isomerized hop extract (if you can get it). Then you only have to boil it for your flavor and aroma hops say 15 minutes followed by a hop stand.

 

[sfish]

and add the rest of the extract at flame out to avoid any harshness.

I thought when using extract it was important to boil at least until the Hot Break? this would settle out proteins

 

[Yooper]

I thought when using extract it was important to boil at least until the Hot Break? this would settle out proteins

Not in my experience. I've added extract at flame out for years and years, back when I did extract brews.

 

[unionrdr]

Extract has already been through a hot break during processing. Adding the remainder at flame out is perfectly safe, as it's the temp to pasteurize moreso than any additional hot break. Pasteurization happening in seconds @ 160F is easy at flame out while the wort's still boiling hot. You might get a dusting of foam, but very little.

 

[kh54s10]

Thanks for the comment.
When do you add the extract to the boil?
I was told that a long boil causes the extract to turn darkish in colour.

That's why I only want to add it like in the last 5 mins or so.

I have always added about 1/3 to 1/2 of the extract at the beginning, added the hops then started the clock. Adding most of the extract late in the boil will keep it from getting as dark as it would if you boiled all of the extract for the whole 60 minutes. I have even added extract after flameout. If the wort is above 170 degrees no infectious organisms should survive.

 

[unionrdr]

My point exactly. Still being boiling hot at flame out is more than enough to pasteurize in seconds.

 

[chickypad]

Here's an article in BYO where James Spencer mentions the experiment I was talking about. It was a small batch only, but as I said they actually preferred the one with hops just boiled in water and did not find any off flavors. Sounds like it is in their first brewing video episode if you want to see the whole thing.

I say try it!


BYO article

Quote:
"So, I decided to conduct a test. I boiled two 1-gallon (3.8-L) batches side-by-side on the stove. In one, I added malt extract and hops at the beginning of the hour-long boil. In the other, I added hops to plain water and waited until the last fifteen minutes to add the extract. My co-host, Steve Wilkes, and I tasted the two samples on the show, which also turned into the first episode of Basic Brewing Video. (We found no off-flavors from boiling the hops in water, but we did find that the hop character and color of the two batches differed considerably.) "

 

[sfish]

Not in my experience. I've added extract at flame out for years and years, back when I did extract brews.

Thank you.. New good information for me changes things.

I was just following Palmer chapter 7.2 (before this info) adding near the end and allowing to hot break boil then flame out.

http://www.howtobrew.com/section1/chapter7-2.html

 

[Yooper]

Thank you.. New good information for me changes things.

I was just following Palmer chapter 7.2 (before this info) adding near the end and allowing to hot break boil then flame out.

http://www.howtobrew.com/section1/chapter7-2.html

I love Palmer- he's a super guy who has done a lot for homebrewing- but his book is quite dated now, especially that online version. He has several other things he's come out and said that he 'got wrong' in the book- including hops utilization being dependent on wort gravity- and he's the first to admit it in more current podcasts and in conversation. He started saying the things about IBUs and hops utilization in about 2008(?) at a conference I was at, and is definitely open to updating his opinions. You can find him talking about these things in more current podcasts, but I haven't seen or heard of any very recently at all.

And it is possible that you can get a hot break with extract- but sometimes no matter how long you boil, you won't because (as unionrdr said) it's already happened when the extract was made. So it may happen, it may not- but it doesn't matter anyway.

 

[unionrdr]

Yeah, that's true every time but one. That darn Bavarian Wheat DME. sheez, talk about beersuvious! Otherwise, at best I get a dusting of foam that's rather weak when using extracts.

 

[corycorycory09]

He has several other things he's come out and said that he 'got wrong' in the book- including hops utilization being dependent on wort gravity- and he's the first to admit it in more current podcasts and in conversation.

I've been using his utilization formula. Is utilization really not affected by gravity? Do you have a formula you use to calculate IBU contributions based on time that ignores wort gravity?

 

[Yooper]

I've been using his utilization formula. Is utilization really not affected by gravity? Do you have a formula you use to calculate IBU contributions based on time that ignores wort gravity?

No, there hasn't been a new formula yet. I'd suggest listening to a podcast from Basic Brewing Radio, with Palmer as a guest in around(?) 2008 called "What is an IBU, really?" that sound answer as many questions as it raises!

Right now, the Rager and Tinseth formula are about the best we have, but there is a lot that goes into utilization (like pH and dilution) that isn't taken into account.

 

[tritch]

To preface this I would like to say that I have only finished brewing my second batch this last weekend so my experience is rather limited.

In reference to the hot break I did try to add 3.15 lbs LME to a 3 gallon partial boil (only have a 15.5 qt pot) this past weekend and tried to wait for a hot break (which in my understanding is just a lot of foaming on top and the wort trying to boil over). I think I did get a very small one and then I started my timer and added the first of my hops. This caused much more foaming but not too much. I added the remaining 6lbs LME to the boil with 15 min left. By the time I added the 5 minute hop addition it really started to foam and I had to add a small amount of cold water almost continuously to keep it from boiling over for the last few minutes before the end of the boil.

Was this a hot break that I just had trouble keeping under control or was it something else?
Also, when adding the extract late it drops the temperature down and it took a few minutes to start boiling again. Is this a problem?
Because of these things I have thought about trying to add all the extract at flameout and think that might be what I try next time and am glad that it seems that it won't negatively affect the hops.

 

[Elysium]

That is my understanding- that the water-only boiled hops were extremely harsh and not altogether pleasant. I did not try this myself, but I would probably add, oh, a pound of extract per gallon of liquid boiled, more or less, and add the rest of the extract at flame out to avoid any harshness.

But this brings up the question: how long of a boil would be required in an extract brew like this? Since there are not compounds derived from mashing that need to be boiled off. So, maybe a short boil can add the requiered bitterness, aroma and flavours...say, 25 min+10min+0min hop additions to get a nice light beer.

What do you think? (Obviously these are just random hop addition times....it requires more looking into to get the times and numbers right).

 

[unionrdr]

The hop isomerization would still take 60 minutes or so to get the full bittering potential of the hop used. But lighter wort seem to increase the added hops efficiency in my experiences. But beer/wort being acidic by nature, I think the way it effects PH by volume & gravity has something, at least, to do with it?

 

[Yooper]

But this brings up the question: how long of a boil would be required in an extract brew like this? Since there are not compounds derived from mashing that need to be boiled off. So, maybe a short boil can add the requiered bitterness, aroma and flavours...say, 25 min+10min+0min hop additions to get a nice light beer.

What do you think? (Obviously these are just random hop addition times....it requires more looking into to get the times and numbers right).

It depends on how much you want to spend on hops, in exchange for the shorter boil. Also, you'll have far more hops flavor in the finished beer in the beer with 30 and 10 minute additions vs 60 minutes only. In other words, it takes more hops at 30 minutes to get the same bittering you'd get from one addition at 60 minutes, plus the later the hops are added, the more hops flavor you'd get. Nice for an American pale ale, but not so much for a German altbier.

Also, remember that saving 20 minutes of boil time isn't really saving all that much time in the long run- the wort still has to be chilled, etc, so saving a bit of boil time may work or not, depending on the intended outcome.

 

[Jim311]

My most recent recipe kit from the LHBS suggests adding the last half of the extract in the last 10 minutes of the boil.

 

[markklug]

I am wondering if good beer can be obtained (something that people would even believe to be a real all-grain craft brew) from the following idea:

-boil water for 60 mins to get the required acid from the hops
-add pale ale malt extract in the last five minutes
-chill and ferment

Has anyone ever done an extract brew with the above mentioned instructions?

I am an all grain brewer with about 20 batches under my belt but still occasionally play with extract batches in an effort to make decent quality drinking beer in a short time. I also do a RIS extract with specialty grains because it is easy and tastes really really good so I've been too lazy to convert it to all grain.

I started recently playing with a new hop I wanted to try for aroma and decided to do a "quick" brew. I did a 2 gallon boil with 1 pound of dme and hops for 15 minutes to achieve the desired level of bittering for a 5 gallon batch of pale ale. After 15 minutes I added the remaining lme/dme and verified I was still above 160F to ensure sanitation. I then added 2 oz of finishing hops and moved the pot to the sink and ice bath. After a quick chill I removed the hops and added to the fermenter with top up water already sitting chilled in my fridge so I was at pitching temperature. After ferment I dry hopped with the same hop as finishing. The beer turned out very well, cleared quickly. Most of the people I have asked to evaluate it perceive it as more bitter than I intended as an APA. It's affectionately known as the 15 minute IPA and many have asked I repeat it.

So I do believe that you can make good tasting beer with a short boil. I still have about a gallon left in the keg........

 

[Minky]

I did a 2 gallon boil with 1 pound of dme and hops for 15 minutes to achieve the desired level of bittering for a 5 gallon batch of pale ale.

Did you use more hops in this step than would normally be used in a 60 minute boil?

 

[rmyurick]

"Hot break" is not foaming, but rather proteins and other compounds coagulating & forming polymers that settle out--that "other stuff" that settles out with the hops at the end of the boil.

 

[markklug]

Did you use more hops in this step than would normally be used in a 60 minute boil?

Will be more than is needed for all grain, but the about the same if doing a reduced volume extract boil. I have the exact recipe at home to check, but some quick brewersfriend calculations for comparison:

5 gallon 1.050 pale ale

All Grain full volume boil(6.5 gal) for 60 minutes with .6 ounce Magnum(15 AAU) results in roughly 38 IBU

Extract boil 2.5 gallons for 60 minutes with 1 ounce magnum(15 AAU) results in roughly 36 IBU

Extract boil 2.5 gallons with 1 pound dme for 15 minutes with 1 ounce magnum(15 AAU) results in roughly 38 IBU