...yet another primary/dry hop timing question.

[jwwdvm]

Did anyone catch The Jamil Show with the Matt Brynildson, Union Jack brewer, interview? If I understood correctly, he likes to dry hop before fermentation is complete because the active yeast do good things with the hops.

I've been following the recommendation to primary for a month, and then bottling. For this time schedule, I've been dry hopping for the last week of the month, well after the yeast seem to have completed active fermentation.

If I follow Matt's recommendation, I should be dry hopping early, probably after three or four days. Is anyone here doing that? If so, how does beer dry hopped while the yeast are still a bit active (and kegged/bottled early) compare to beer dry hopped after fermentation is well over (and kegged/bottled much later)?

Thanks for any thoughts.

 

[Nanobru]

You might not be able to tell the difference. Breweries typically dry hop 2 points before terminal gravity ie: FG=1.016, so you would dry hop at 1.018. It helps to drop the temp at the same time. You might be surprised that a one month primary is sometimes unnecessary.

 

[kedash]

You might not be able to tell the difference. Breweries typically dry hop 2 points before terminal gravity ie: FG=1.016, so you would dry hop at 1.014. It helps to drop the temp at the same time. You might be surprised that a one month primary is sometimes unnecessary.

Did you mean that the other way around? The FG can't get higher than it was.

 

[Six_O_Turbo]

It can be done either way. Many people believe the yeast will clean up any off flavors as a result of oxygen being introduced to the beer while dry hopping, and therefore dry hop before fermentation is compete.

Others believe you lose some hop aroma via degassing CO2 if you dry hop before fermentation is complete, so they wait until they are sure they have reached their FG before dry hopping.

Both are correct, IMO. I prefer to dry hop before fermentation is complete, but use a litte extra hops to make up for some of the aroma being carried of by CO2.

Oh... and a one month primary is rarely necessary for most normal gravity ales as long as you have pitched a proper amount of healthy yeast.

 

[jwwdvm]

Thanks for the replies! Nanobru and Six 0 Turbo you've convinced me to experiment on the dark side; I just dry hopped my current brew at the tail end of fermenting (four days post pitching).

Matt's statement in the interview that the yeast did good things for the dry hop flavors, creating flavors that you don't get otherwise, is interesting. I suppose the question is how active the yeast need to be. If you dry hop three weeks out in the primary, are the yeast really so inactive that you miss these flavors? Regardless, its sounds like an argument for dry hopping in the primary whether you do it early or late.

I wonder if you did half of your dry hop at the end of active fermentation and the other half after fermentation (to avoid the degassing that Turbo mentions) if you would get the best of both worlds?

 

[ScubaSteve]

I think you're spot on with what you're doing. That third week is perfect because you're still bulk aging, and fermentation has died down. I like to use an ounce of whole hops....there's a whole lot of fresh hop aroma coming through that way. Then, when I rack to the keg, I will use another ounce (usually the other ounce from the 2 ounce pkg) in a hop ball attached to the diptube. It works awesome.

FWIW, the guys at Stone have said that they find that dry hopping peaks at around 7 days for the best aroma. That being said, you want to dry hop relatively close to serving if you can.