I was found growing wild along a railroad bed. When fresh and chewed I caused burps that tasted like Centennial. Paired with 10lbs of 2row, 1 lb of crystal 20 and fermented with S-04 I am orange/citrus, fruity and floral. The beer I'm in is well balance and damned awful tasty. Who am I?
Name that Hop
- Thread starter Robar
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Nightshade
Well-Known Member
Czech Saaz
Robar
Well-Known Member
Czech Saaz
Why do you suggest Chez Saaz? I've never used it in any of my beers so I have no first hand knowledge of what it brings to mix. From what I've read it doesn't really sound like Saaz though it can exhibit higher levels of Humulene. Is 19 - 45% Humulene bringing the coriander flavor to the front thus giving me the "Orange" flavor?
What about the floral / fruity smell and flavor? When I dried these they had a floral / dried fruit scent. I know that S-04 can and will bring some fruitiness to the beer as well so I'm not sure how much of each is brought out by the yeast or the hops. The grain bill is straight forward as I didn't want complex malt characters throwing me off on the original purpose of this brew which was to see what the hops were all about.
This beer ended up being sweet & fruity with a nice floral mixed in. Not too hoppy but with a nicely balancing bitterness. Everyone who has tried it are home brewers or used to drinking home brew / craft beers and have said it is very tasty and extremely well balanced though they are not able to tell me with any conviction what hops the most resemble.
I have enough of the wild hops left to do one more batch. After that I would like to be able to reproduce it without waiting until next fall to do so.
mikesr71
Member
maybe it is centennial?? no way its something crazy like wild citra.....i would go back and try to get some of the rhizomes cuz it sounds very tasty
Robar
Well-Known Member
LOL No I didn't think it was anything like that. I do however entertain the idea that maybe more than one strain is at play here. Though real close to each other (10 no more than 15 feet apart) there was what seemed to be two separate growths of hops. The leaves looked the same but the cones on one were generally small reminding me of clover buds in shape and size while the other had larger cones and some were elongated and somewhat flat.
There is also the possibility of wild pollenization creating something different. Some of our well know hops in use today have a wild parent. So who knows?
Also no on the centennial I'm pretty familiar with that and other than original burps from chewing it when fresh I see no similarities.
I do intend to go back and harvest rhizomes from both sections and planting them here at home. Hopefully a few years down the road I will have a reliable supply.
