1st extract brew-Hop utilisation in a water only boil?

[drf]

I'm planning my first extract brew. I can't boil any sensible volume of wort due to space constraints so I'm considering boiling the hops in water only (or water+steeped black malt). The recipe is a Belhaven 90/- from Graham Wheeler's book, adjusted to the amount of DME I have. This would give

DME 2000g
Sugar 274g
Black malt 77g
WGV hops 90min 32g
10min 10.5g
Final volume 11.7L

Those figures use a hop utilisation of 20.6% based on an OG of 1070 to give a final EBU=36

I used the YoBrew calculator on the extract page with settings for no sugars added to the boil and, due to the large increase in hop utilisation, end up with hop amounts as

WGV hops 60min 18g
10min 6g

Which is much lower. Three questions:

-Does anyone have experience of water-only boils and is it correct that the amount of hops used should be reduced by a significant amount

-The calculator is obviously working out the bittering contribution of the hops, but what about the flavour for the final 10min addition? Is 'flavour utilisation' also increased when boiling in low gravity, or should I have the 10min addition more similar to the full mash recipe?

TIA

 

[RobWalker]

Hang on, little confused - are you scaling the recipe down, or just the boil volume and then topping up to 23L? Your DME suggests a full batch but your final volume is 11.7L, are you topping that up?

I would heavily suggest trying at least a 5-10 litre boil, you need to boil the DME to get the hot break too, and you can throw the black malt into the boil and get all the flavour out. I make good beer on a 10 litre extract boil, the only difference is needing to up the hops - obviously you sacrifice a little body, maybe get a darker colour etc, but generally it's a good quality method.

 

[drf]

Hang on, little confused - are you scaling the recipe down, or just the boil volume and then topping up to 23L? Your DME suggests a full batch but your final volume is 11.7L, are you topping that up?

It's scaled down from 19L to 11.7L. The original recipe uses 3240g DME, 445g sugar, 125g black malt, 19L final for an OG 1070. I have 2000g DME available. Adjusting hops from original recipe to 11.7L gives 32g 90min; 10.5g 10min.

I would heavily suggest trying at least a 5-10 litre boil, you need to boil the DME to get the hot break too

I was wondering that. I've seen conflicting advice regarding hot break and malt extract. After all, kits consist of liquid malt extract and you don't boil those.

My largest pot is a 6L pressure cooker. I imagine it's not sensible to boil more than 4L in that. I worry about being able to get 2000g DME into 4L, dissolved and to stay in the pot! I've got a 4L pan as well, so I suppose I could do 4L + 2L for a total 6L boil, 11.7L final volume.

I make good beer on a 10 litre extract boil, the only difference is needing to up the hops - obviously you sacrifice a little body, maybe get a darker colour etc, but generally it's a good quality method.

To be honest I don't mind upping the hops, I've got 100g and I know they degrade upon storage. It's more the practicalities of getting the DME into solution and boiled with the pots I have.

I'm also a little confused about hop utilisation in relation to using malt extract. I know that hop utilisation decreases with protein content, and that OG can be used as a proxy for protein content when applied to an all grain process. Does hop utilisation decrease in the same way when using malt extract in high concentrations? I suppose that's related to the hot break question, i.e. if there're fewerr proteins in extract then hop utilisation will be improved and boiling to achieve a hot break is less important.

 

[Dr. B]

I have been doing a 9L boil for extracts and not upping the hops.

I have noticed the beers tend to have a sweet maltiness to them (or is that a malty sweetness?), probably due to insufficient hop extraction.
I quite like the taste actually, but definitely up the hops if you can.