Maintain hoppiness been bottling

[kokonutz]

Hi all. On bottling day my beers always show strong potential, good bitter happiness and good aroma. Specifically I’m talking about some IPA beers that I brewed in the last couple months. However I seem to lose a lot of this in the bottling process. I’m doing my best to move quickly , keeping my bottling bucket covered ,don’t splash, etc...but after two or three weeks in the bottle I seem to have lost the bitterness that I had when I tried my sample from bottling day. It’s as if the character of the beer evaporated in the bottle.

Of course this problem could be from anything during the entire brew process but I keep thinking in my head it’s coming from the oxidation that happens innately from bottling. With that said kegging is not an option for financial and real estate reasons. So I have to stick to the bottles. I’ve heard all sorts of stuff from Campton tablets to CO2 purging. But I know beer has been done for centuries and a lot of this technology didn’t exist then so I’m curious what the practises are that most of the bottlers out here use to keep that bitter and hoppy aroma. This beer had great character on day one of bottling so what am I missing here? Do I really need to go out and buy a CO2 tank and a beer gun?

 

[jdauria]

Kegging and bottling with a beer gun and purging bottles with CO2 would definitely help...but that not being an option...check this out...http://brulosophy.com/2020/06/08/cold-side-oxidation-impact-of-dosing-american-ipa-with-sodium-metabisulfite-at-packaging-exbeeriment-results/

Sodium metabisulfite is basically want makes up Campden tablets (or some use potassium metabisulfite), you can buy it in powder form. Also, when you bottle, are you using oxygen absorbing bottle caps? If not, use them...if you are, make sure you cap on foam as the caps need to get wet to activate them and then they are suppose to absorb oxygen. Not sure if they really work...but worth a try.

 

[kokonutz]

Kegging and bottling with a beer gun and purging bottles with CO2 would definitely help...but that not being an option...check this out...http://brulosophy.com/2020/06/08/cold-side-oxidation-impact-of-dosing-american-ipa-with-sodium-metabisulfite-at-packaging-exbeeriment-results/

Sodium metabisulfite is basically want makes up Campden tablets (or some use potassium metabisulfite), you can buy it in powder form. Also, when you bottle, are you using oxygen absorbing bottle caps? If not, use them...if you are, make sure you cap on foam as the caps need to get wet to activate them and then they are suppose to absorb oxygen. Not sure if they really work...but worth a try.

i may have to try the SMB trick - i know i can get PMB too...is there a noticable difference?

 

[Vale71]

But I know beer has been done for centuries and a lot of this technology didn’t exist then so I’m curious what the practises are that most of the bottlers out here use to keep that bitter and hoppy aroma.

Actually beer has been done for millenia. Unfortunately what passed for beer in the past would bear little resemblance to what we expect from modern beer. As long as you don't reduce oxidation you are going to experience its detrimental effect, I'm sorry.
SMB and PMB are the same in that they are equally useless, just stay away from them.

 

[jdauria]

i may have to try the SMB trick - i know i can get PMB too...is there a noticable difference?

Not sure about PMB...have read that it can have a little bit of an odor, so not sure you want to finished beer, but maybe someone else can answer.

 

[BrewnWKopperKat]

Given you said this:

With that said kegging is not an option for financial and real estate reasons.

I will offer this topic Limiting oxidation: effect of purging headspace O2 in a bottle conditioned IPA for your consideration.

If you give it a try, would you be willing to post your results back in that topic?

 

[Argyll Gargoyle]

What is the wisdom on bottling with zero headspace? I did this on my last ipa and they haven’t blown up yet
Is this a terrible idea - if so, can you explain why?

 

[Vale71]

If you really, really leave zero head space then you'll have the beer pushing against the cap. If the bottle warms up significantly beer will expand and since it is an incompressible liquid the cap will have to give way. On the other hand if you leave your bottles in a strictly temperature controlled chamber all the time then you'll probably get away with it.

 

[Argyll Gargoyle]

Another idea for preventing too much oxygenation during bottling: it’s often stated that a new pitch of yeast rapidly gobbles up oxygen during the growth phase. What if you prepared your priming sugar, then pitched SafAle F2 into it as if it were wort. Then add it to your beer once it shows signs of life, stir well, and bottle? Any thoughts on this idea?