Using a tea-ball for my hops.. boog/bad idea?

[Eightysixd]

Hello all. I am now 5 home brews into my new hobby and have purchased a tea-ball to help contain the amount of hops that I have to try and strain out at the end of my process. I used it on my last 2 brews and am currently in the middle of brewing some Octoberfest right now. My question is do you think that it will affect my hops flavoring at all or will it be ok?

 

[mattjmac]

Just my personal experience, but anything more than an ounce or so in one of those tea balls quickly expands to fill up the entire ball. I have to imagine once this happens the hops in the middle aren't contributing what they need to to your wort during the boil. I did two brews like this and they did taste a bit too sweet indicating not enough hop bitterness was transferred. I've since stopped using the tea ball and this problem went away.

FWIW, you really don't need one. Whirlpooling after chilling and then carefully siphoning gets rid of 90% of the hop particles. The other 10% will settle out after fermentation.

 

[Eightysixd]

btw... it works great for keeping it all contained, which is why I worry it may not be letting the hops work to their full potential.

 

[Eightysixd]

Thanks for the advise.... I just opened up the ball and let it do its magic. Guess I'll just have to strain it. Btw... noob question.... but what is whirlpooling?

 

[92greenyj]

I had the same though and tried this recently. I found a half ounce of pellet hops expanded to a thick mess inside it. I decided I'll maybe use them for additions of a quarter ounce or less, but nothing more than that.

Whirlpooling is basically creating a whirlpool in your boil kettle after flame out. Its done using a pump to circulate the wort. the idea is that it will gather the trub in a nice pile in the center at the bottom.

 

[bovineblitz]

I use these things for every single batch. I found extremely large ones on amazon, look for "herb infuser" or "tea infuser" instead of tea ball.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B001AMQQDM/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

I have 3 four inchers and 1 five incher, they've been enough to do all my hop additions even for big IPAs.

They're pretty damn big but even still I prefer to use no more than 1.5oz in each one to ensure that I get good utilization. 2oz would probably be okay too.

A bonus is that I can hang them on the side of my brew kettle by the chain and place them in the spot where the boil is most active.

 

[fineexampl]

What's a boog?

 

[jkreuze]

From Urban Dictionary -

BOOG

an enigma, one that cannot be defined; awe-inspiring. Impressive. And damn sexy
"Behold, the power of BOOG"

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=boog

Urban Dictionary is so silly . .

 

[Eightysixd]

I use these things for every single batch. I found extremely large ones on amazon, look for "herb infuser" or "tea infuser" instead of tea ball.

I have 3 four inchers and 1 five incher, they've been enough to do all my hop additions even for big IPAs.

A bonus is that I can hang them on the side of my brew kettle by the chain and place them in the spot where the boil is most active.

Thanks!! I'll look into that!!

 

[Eightysixd]

Oh... and BOOG was supposed to say GOOD.... but my fingers went crazy on me and I didn't catch it untill i posted. MY BAD.

 

[jjones17]

Lol I figured you were going to add Boog's to your boil. Like as in Boogers. Who knows, maybe it will help with head retention.

Sorry for the off topic I found it hilarious. On topic, I LOOOVE that tea infuser thingy. I might have to buy some.

 

[Eightysixd]

Just my personal experience, but anything more than an ounce or so in one of those tea balls quickly expands to fill up the entire ball. I have to imagine once this happens the hops in the middle aren't contributing what they need to to your wort during the boil. I did two brews like this and they did taste a bit too sweet indicating not enough hop bitterness was transferred. I've since stopped using the tea ball and this problem went away. QUOTE]



So do you think I should dry hop to get some back or just wait and see how my last 2 came out?

 

[barma16]

You could build yourself one of these:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/wiki/index.php/Hop_Bag

Used mine for the first time last Sunday, and it did a pretty good job. 5 mins to put together, too, all with bits you can pick up at your local Home Depot.

 

[bovineblitz]

Just my personal experience, but anything more than an ounce or so in one of those tea balls quickly expands to fill up the entire ball. I have to imagine once this happens the hops in the middle aren't contributing what they need to to your wort during the boil. I did two brews like this and they did taste a bit too sweet indicating not enough hop bitterness was transferred. I've since stopped using the tea ball and this problem went away. QUOTE]



So do you think I should dry hop to get some back or just wait and see how my last 2 came out?

dry hop won't really replace the hop utilization you lost out on, it'll just add to the aroma. If you weren't planning on dry hopping I wouldn't bother now.