Dry Hopped Lager

[Paul7189]

Does anyone have any recommendations for dry hopped lager recipes?

I'm thinking of trying to do a pilsner and following the usual 4 week post fermentation lagering process but I wanted to dry hop it. I was under the impression that dry hopping was best at a warmer temperature but also you lose the aroma and flavour with time so with something like a 4 week largering would that negatively impact the beer?

I usually lager in a keg and don't want to dry hop in the keg into carbonated beer. Would you just treat it like a normal lager and add the hops during diacetyl rest, then cold crash and transfer to keg and lager at a very low temp for 4 weeks? That's my plan so far but I have never tried this before so I was wondering what others have done themselves.

Also would you use typical pilsner hops to make the beer and something IPA like for the dry hopping.

Cheers
Paul

 

[crowcrow]

Hiya, I've been making the Brew Dog Lost Lager for the last year - which is heavily dry hopped. As I pressure ferment in a corny, I dry hop for the whole fermentation period (which is only 5 or 7 days), before 2 or 3 days cold crash, the move to serving keg. I use both a hop spider and a spare lid with a floating dip tube to minimise hop and yeast transfer.

As an alternative I just made an Evil Twin 'Bikini Beer' (2.5 percent) and that I loose dry hopped in the primary for 3 days. Loads of the hops was still very dry on top, but a good cold crash drew it down and let me with a great beer in the keg.

I'd personally dry hop as late as possible before bottling or kegging, but I haven't brewed a 'proper' lager yet. But I love a dry hopped lager.

 

[hoppyscotty]

I did a batch of the 'intensely hopped lager' recipe from the Malt Miller. Worked really well, nice tasty lager. Though if I were doing it again I'd dry hop towards the end of the layering period (I lagered for about 8 to 10 weeks) instead of in the fermenter before transferring to the lagering vessel as I didn't get a particularly strong aroma or hop flavour at the end of the lagering period.

 

[Paul7189]

I did a batch of the 'intensely hopped lager' recipe from the Malt Miller. Worked really well, nice tasty lager. Though if I were doing it again I'd dry hop towards the end of the layering period (I lagered for about 8 to 10 weeks) instead of in the fermenter before transferring to the lagering vessel as I didn't get a particularly strong aroma or hop flavour at the end of the lagering period.

That’s my worry. I want to keep the aroma but have a crisp clear drink. Maybe I’m asking be too much

 

[hoppyscotty]

Well I only have one fermenter so didn't want to tie up my fermenter for the whole lagering period so transferred to a simple fermenting bucket so very limited on keeping oxygen out and any hop aroma and flavour from the dry hop in. The only potential downside to dry hopping during the lagering period is the temperature as I lagered at 1 degree C. I believe (could be wrong here) that ideally you want to dry hop around 15 degrees C for best extraction so assume that any colder than that you are not getting the same level of extraction from the hops, so maybe after the lagering period is over to raise the temperature again to 15 degrees C, and dry hop for a few days at the higher temperature just ahead of packaging.

 

[Paul7189]

Well I only have one fermenter so didn't want to tie up my fermenter for the whole lagering period so transferred to a simple fermenting bucket so very limited on keeping oxygen out and any hop aroma and flavour from the dry hop in. The only potential downside to dry hopping during the lagering period is the temperature as I lagered at 1 degree C. I believe (could be wrong here) that ideally you want to dry hop around 15 degrees C for best extraction so assume that any colder than that you are not getting the same level of extraction from the hops, so maybe after the lagering period is over to raise the temperature again to 15 degrees C, and dry hop for a few days at the higher temperature just ahead of packaging.

I did think that but I lager in my kegs and carbonate at the same time and dry hopping into a carbonated beer is not ideal. I think I’m going to just treat it like normal and add the hops during the diacetyl rest where the temps are higher, cold crash and keg then hopefully the aroma will last the 4 weeks conditioning period. Or just stick to west coast IPAs

 

[hoppyscotty]

I guess you could make a hop tea and transfer into the keg that way? Maybe pull some beer off, make the tea with that, then push it back into the keg?

 

[Benfleet Brewery]

Adnams do a dry hopped lager that I like which is dry hopped with Galaxy so a few months ago I made a pseudo lager and added 2.5ml of Outback dry hop extract to the keg and that turned out really nice in my opinion. I would probably add a bit more next time.

https://www.crossmyloofbrew.co.uk/online-store/Dry-Hop-Extract-p241775576