Brewing same recipes and hops

[Kevin Marien]

Hey,

Another newbie question.

I brewed a NEIPA last year which I really enjoyed during the summer. So I want to do a rebrew of it. I would like to see how close I get to the original recipe so I bought all the hops again. I know I best adjust my IBU for bittering, but most of the hops I use are after the boil and some more at 78° and then ofcourse the sweet dryhops. Now the question is: Do I need to level out the AA for those also? Keep the same amount or is there something else I am overlooking?

 

[phildo79]

No need to change them as the AAU's are only really important for bittering. The changes to the hops at the end of the boil will be nominal, if any.

 

[PhilBrew]

Hi phildo

No need to change them as the AAU's are only really important for bittering. The changes to the hops at the end of the boil will be nominal, if any.

... while I agree that it'll be unlikely to make a significant difference ... after all when a recipe says "add a $hitload of hops, then another $hitload, then another $hitload ... " then the differences around $shitload +/- 10% are likely to be nominal

... but a conversation with a hop grower, who had seen results of LOTS more hop analyses than I've ever seen, convinced me that (in general) while the proportions of the different hop oils in different hop strains will be quite different, for a particular strain the relative proportions will be consistent, but the (absolute) quantities will vary from crop to crop ... just like the AA% will vary, and in fact roughly in proportion to the changes in AA% ... so, if the conditions were such that the hop flowers were able to produce 20% more alpha-acids, then they'll probably have produced 20% more hop oils (providing 20% more flavour/aroma) also ... the extreme example he cited, during our conversation, was around how Cascade hops grown somewhere like UK (which will tend to have MUCH lower AA% than US grown Cascades) will need more added late/whirlpooled/dry-hopped to have a similar flavour/aroma impact to those where they grow to higher AA%

So I think the answer is more likely to be a "depends how different the hops are" one
Cheers, PhilB

 

[Kevin Marien]

Hey, thanks both. Just as an update I adjusted the bittering hops to match the AA I required and kept all the whirlpool/dryhop editions the same, and it was fairly similar, keg didn't last too long which is good. :) So editions at end of the boil don't seem to be affected by AA or in aroma too much.... (if you use a LOT of them )