Hops in the sparge water?

[46andbrew]

So I'm not new to brewing but I am going to be doing my first all grain batch tomorrow. I was drinking a worm town hopulence and reading the back of the bottle. It says they do every hop addition for that beer. Great beer too which I'm sure is why it took the gold. It got me thinking though. So bear with me.

So I start my mash and while thats going in my other pot I'm heating my sparge water to 170. I'm going to be doing a batch sparge but it would probably work for both. Could and would it make sense to throw a couple oz of whole cone hops in the sparge water and let them stew at 170 until my mash is done. Then dump the water in and sparge.

Maybe this is already a method or maybe it's not worth it or just crazy. So I figured I would ask u guys and gals. Thanks


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[hercher]

My gut feeling is it isn't worth it. I've heard of people throwing hops in the mash, and of course a lot of people practice first wort hopping. My taste buds have never noticed much difference than just boiling for 60-90 minutes. You probably would be better off using pellets if you try it, since the utilization rate is going to be higher.

 

[tgmartin000]

I've been wanting to try that very thing . I assume it would be like mash hopping. Try it and let us know how it works!

 

[46andbrew]

Ya I've been drinking a lot of flavor and aroma forward IPAs so I've been trying ways to achieve that. I've done fwh I've have steeped hops. My thinking was if I stewed the hops at 170 for 30 min or so I would extract the same oils that a whirlpool would achieve if that makes sense.


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[bbrim]

Those good delicate oils from a whirlpool do not survive a boil and that is why a whirlpool works so well. If you do get those oils into your sparge water they will boil off. Alpha acid doesn't dissolve well so hops in the sparge water wouldn't be very helpful in extracting bitterness. It is iso-alpha acids that give the bitterness to the beer and these are developed by boiling.
To maximize hop flavor and aroma you should really load up at the end of the boil. For hop forward beers I like to use 4-5 ounces in the last 15 minutes, usually 2 ounces at flameout. My additions may even be modest compared to hardcore hopheads.

 

[j1n]

After the boil cool the wort down to 180 then do a hop steep. that would work much better than steeping in the sparge water.

 

[46andbrew]

Cool that really is what I was wondering about them boiling off.


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[wilserbrewer]

By all means give it a try if you are so inclined.

The issue I see is that the sparge water is not hot enough to extract bitterness, and any flavor and aroma extracted will be boiled off later in the process....so intuitively it seems like a lose lose situation.