Pellet dry hop in keg...possible error

[Onkel_Udo]

I may have misread all the post on this and made a big mistake. I normally dry hop in the keg but use a muslin sack with a weight and whole hops. This time, I had some pellet hops I wanted to use (just an ounce) so I did what I had thought I read other doing...just tossed them in the keg.

The keg was chilled for 7 days and has been at serving pressure the whole time so I drew a pint. Lots of hop material but not worried (tastes really good) so let it sit two more days...pulled another with lots of hop material. Waited another day and the same. Now I am a little concerned.

So was it only "just tossing them in" for the fermentor? Would bleeding the carbonation off and adding gelatin help.

 

[estricklin]

I've never added whole hops in the keg, only as you have done with a muslin bag and pellets. I can tell you that the gelatin probably won't do anything to help it clear, especially since your serving from a keg.

You could let everything settle for a while and then you an autosiphon to rack to another keg, probably not worth the trouble though.

 

[Yooper]

I'm not sure what to tell you know- the pellet hops debris will clog up your diptube and poppit sooner or later. You could try pulling the diptube, and cleaning it out, and using something to help strain the beer, like a muslin bag over the diptube or something when it clogs.

I've seem some stainless diptube strainers that go on the long diptube but I don't think even those would work with pellet hops.

I use a very fine mesh muslin bag with pellet hops- they are worse then whole cone hops in a keg for me. I can use 'tea ball' strainers with whole hops, but not with pellets since they disintegrate. Even in a muslin bag, sometimes they come through and clog up my posts/poppits and my quick disconnects on the beer line.

 

[Bamsdealer]

I use a paint strainer bag with pellet hops and a shot glass for weight. Used to suspend them with floss but have wasted a couple co2 tanks because a small percentage of the time a gas leak would develop around d the seal. Now I just tie off the bag and toss it in. Never had an issue minus a little hop dust and yeast at first. I like the results much more than a standard dry hop and there is less potential for a stale beer.

 

[Bamsdealer]

If you have extra kegs consider cutting a couple inches off a diptube or just racking off the top to a new keg.

 

[Bamsdealer]

And I meant to clarify that the shot glass only goes in when using whole hops. Pellets will sink on their own. I typically use pellets to keg hop with but there will be a little hop dust your first couple pours or before everything drops out.

 

[itsrolled]

I have done the same thing. I just pulled a 1/2 gallon growler at once. that pretty much sucked up a large amount of the hops. then I pulled the dip tube, blew it out and had no problems after that

 

[Onkel_Udo]

Just pulled a 1.5 gallon Tap-a-Draft bottle off for the track. Will be interesting to see how it turns out. At the track we drink from red solo cups so no issue. The remaining 2.5'ish gallons can be presonal consumption as I do not mind a a bit of hop debris as a digestive aid.

Learned my lesson. I prefer whole hops for my 3-tier, pellets for ersatz BIAB winter system and whole hops for dry hopping anyway. I have about 4#'s of boiled and de-oiled SS washers anyway.