hops order

[derbedeu]

Hello,

As always, I apologize for posting something that may already have been discussed. I am wondering about the order I am supposed to add hops to my recipes. I know that, by the book, you always add bittering hops first and aroma last, usually at t-45 to t-1, but, what do you do with dual purpose hops?

For example, I intend to use for a 50 gallons recipe (53 to be more exact) the following hop additions:

t-45 100g Magnum, 15.6%
t-30 100g Chinook, 13.3%
t-20 100g Galaxy 13.1%
t-10 100g Northern Brewer 10.1%
t-5 100g Citra 13.8%

I cannot explain the hops choice, nor the quantities - maybe it's just that it's easier to use whole bags - but, in terms of bittering/dual purpose/aroma, and AA%, is it a logical sequence??

Thank you very much for your patience and for your replies, in advance...
Der

 

[Manufacturedevolution]

I usually use magnum, chinook, and northern brewer as bittering hops and galaxy and citra as aroma. Sometimes NB as aroma too. That's roughly 3.5oz a charge there I can't do the math in my head as to the ibus you're at with 50 gallons but seems like a strange choice of hops in my opinion. Sounds like a rather large batch to experiment with. What style beer are you making?

 

[derbedeu]

Hey there, that's some kind of pale ale I accidentally made once I decided to clear all the malts I had in my brewery. First batch, 2 years back, was with Centennial, Cascade, Chinook and Citra, but I decided to rotate every once in a while. It usually turns out as a fruity beer, with a decent bitterness, around 28-30 IBU as per my calculations. What I used almost all the time was NB for bittering, last 4-5 batches I decided to use both NB and Magnum, with good results, and for aroma I cycled Amarillo, Cascade, Citra, sometimes also Chinook.

However, I could not decide what's the best order, not necessarily in terms of T-time, but in terms of AA% and place in the schedule.

 

[Northern_Brewer]

I know that, by the book, you always add bittering hops first and aroma last, usually at t-45 to t-1, but, what do you do with dual purpose hops?

This is going to get confusing - but you're looking at labels applied to hops, which are no guide to what timings you should use them for.

What matters for timing purposes is what's happening in the beer. So if you're trying to extract alpha acids and isomerise them to turn them into "bitterness" in the beer, then the longer the better in the boil - typically 60 minutes but can be more or less. If you're trying to extract mid-weight flavour compounds then they need hot water to extract them but are destroyed by say 30 minutes at boiling point, so they're added towards the end of the boil. If you're trying to extract the most delicate aroma compounds then they needed to be added at cooler temperatures to stop them boiling off, so they get added in the whirlpool or as dry hops.

So even though something like Bravo might be labelled by the hop people as a bittering hop, and would normally be added at eg 60 minutes to impart bitterness, there's no reason why you can't add it in the whirlpool if you are trying to use it for aroma in the beer. Likewise the whole point of dual-purpose hops is that you either add them early for bittering or late for aroma - you don't add them at 30 minutes as some kind of compromise.

It's confusing I know but hopefully the above makes sense?

 

[derbedeu]

Hey NB, thanks for the detailed reply. It is not confusing at all, actually it's a lot of common sense. Perhaps I was a bit unclear in my original question (of course I would never add a DP hop at t-30 and expect aroma). So I will try to reformulate it.

When timing should I use so that the hops that I listed provide the optimal benefits and balance to the recipe? Should I delay Galaxy, Chinook and NB towards the last 10 minutes of the boil? Or, perhaps the hop choice is weird, and I should not mix them? Any advise is most appreciated.

Thank you,
der