Dry hopping vs hop tea

[BruinTuns]

I've just spent hours googling this and with so many contradictory opinions I gave up, it's just frustrating.
But by most accounts, dry hopping adds aroma while hop tea - steeping in hot but not boiling water - will impart flavour, and boiling will add bitterness.
Logically then, adding a hop tea and dry hopping should add flavour and aroma? Or is it not so simple?
I'm probably more interested in enhancing flavour, so if anyone's an experienced 'tea' user I'd be grateful for advice.

Also, is it possible to brew hop tea and then add it to the beer at the drinking stage? Has anyone tried this?

 

[clibit]

I've posted on another thread today about this. I've done hop teas quite a few times, due to the convenience - but I'm reaching the conclusion that I prefer other hopping methods. You seem to get better flavour and aroma if the hops are boiled or steeped in beer, rather than plain water.

Therefore, my advice, for what it's worth, would be to boil hops in wort for short amounts of time to get flavour (and some aroma too). And dry hop for more aroma. If you are making kits without any grain additions, add some DME to the pan and boil the hops in that.

If you boil hops for around 5-10 minutes you will get aroma and some flavour. If you boil hops for 15-20 minutes you will get flavour, and some aroma.

Bitterness mostly comes from boiling hops for 30-60 minutes, or longer.

 

[BruinTuns]

..."my advice, for what it's worth"..

A lot as always, and I'll be following it. Including possibly splitting my next brew into two to compare results as you've suggested previously.
It will be another John Bull IPA and I'm thinking of hopping one half and not the other, or perhaps Fuggles in one fv and Amarillo in the other.
I'll boil in dme solution as you recommend (100g per 500ml water?) for 20 minutes. Is 30g per 10 litres of wort a good starting point?

 

[clibit]

I'd use about 500g of DME and 3 litres of water. Either do two additions, at 15/20 and 5 minutes, or one addition at 10 minutes.

25-30g in 10 litres is a good amount. Quite a lot. Be careful of boiling this amount of high alpha hops for 20 minutes, they will add quite a lot of bitterness. If the hops are around 8 - 12%AA, just boil for 5-10 minutes. If they are 13% ish or above, stick to 5 minutes.

I've made some overly bitter beers by adding hops like Apollo, Summit, Columbus with around 15 minutes to go. Time mellowed them eventually, but I hate waiting!

 

[dad_of_jon]

I've just spent hours googling this and with so many contradictory opinions I gave up, it's just frustrating.
But by most accounts, dry hopping adds aroma while hop tea - steeping in hot but not boiling water - will impart flavour, and boiling will add bitterness.
Logically then, adding a hop tea and dry hopping should add flavour and aroma? Or is it not so simple?
I'm probably more interested in enhancing flavour, so if anyone's an experienced 'tea' user I'd be grateful for advice.

Also, is it possible to brew hop tea and then add it to the beer at the drinking stage? Has anyone tried this?

I hop tea'd my first brew to 'boost' a tom caxtons ale kit. I used the hop tea to rinse out the malt extract can then brewed short for 5.12% abv. It was very nice but I want more hops and abv in my next one so did a 17 min boil in the wort in this:

http://direct.asda.com/george/georg...m/001457275,default,pd.html?cgid=D26M08G08C12

again topping up with cold refrigerated bottled water. Then in addition to the 50g galaxy & 50g citra boiled pellets in a bag added the same amount to the fv. Took them both out at 7 days. The smell from the airlock was divine, hope there's some flavour in there, I think the aroma's already left town!

 

[BruinTuns]

clibit, thank you again, very helpful and thorough replies.

dad_of_jon, good luck with your brew. Out of interest, what is the capacity of that Asda stockpot?
And what did you do with the boiled hops after draining? Chuck them or add to the fv with the 'tea'?

 

[dad_of_jon]

The pot was 8 Litres to the brim. which is about 5.5 usable on a boil.

for the hop tea I used a 3 Litre pot which was only just large enough for the tea, hence the purchase of the bigger pot to give me more flexibility.

But the boil hops on my last brew went into the fv with the non boiled hops.(or should I say 0 minute addition or at flame out?)

I threw the hops after making the tea. I was unsure of my original IBU's because I also added the kits hop sachet in. however for my new brew I should get 70 IBU's and around 7.2 % abv as my OG was 1.068.

 

[BruinTuns]

1068 is very high, what's the kit? Did you add extra fermentables?

I'm going OT with that question (just curious).
Re the OP, has anyone heard of or tried adding hop tea (or extract) at the drinking stage? Could that work?

 

[clibit]

Re the OP, has anyone heard of or tried adding hop tea (or extract) at the drinking stage? Could that work?

No, and no!

 

[BruinTuns]

clibit, it's not like you to beat about the bush, tell it to me straight!

 

[pms67]

I've just spent hours googling this and with so many contradictory opinions I gave up, it's just frustrating.
But by most accounts, dry hopping adds aroma while hop tea - steeping in hot but not boiling water - will impart flavour, and boiling will add bitterness.
Logically then, adding a hop tea and dry hopping should add flavour and aroma? Or is it not so simple?
I'm probably more interested in enhancing flavour, so if anyone's an experienced 'tea' user I'd be grateful for advice.

Also, is it possible to brew hop tea and then add it to the beer at the drinking stage? Has anyone tried this?

This is a good subject and has a lot of different views,being a master brewer myself (only ever brewed kits :hmm:) I have found that the most effective method for me by a country mile is to throw at least 50g of desired pellets into the FV 5 days before transferring then bottling.I have tried adding leaf hops in a bag but nowhere near the same results.
I think this is why the premium kits supply pellets even though the LME is already pre-hopped although it can be a real pain transferring due to clogging.
Not sure about only aroma being added,I think this is a bit of a myth as it certainly adds a whole lot of flavour as well.
In saying all this,if I could get the same effect from adding a tea as you say,I would be up for that too.
:hat:

 

[clibit]

Interesting that you find pellets are much more effective than leaf hops. I've almost exclusively used leaf, and never dry hopped with pellets.

Agree about dry hopping giving flavour too. But I think short boils are more effective for flavour, with fewer hops, and dry hopping is the best way of getting aroma. Just my experience.

 

[pms67]

Interesting that you find pellets are much more effective than leaf hops. I've almost exclusively used leaf, and never dry hopped with pellets.

Agree about dry hopping giving flavour too. But I think short boils are more effective for flavour, with fewer hops, and dry hopping is the best way of getting aroma. Just my experience.

I must experiment more with short boils but can I boil the hops with my added DME in a pot as I once heard not to boil the wort ?
I can only really speak for dry hopping but pellets are more pungent if that makes sense and seem to penetrate the wort better?
I'm sure Brewdog use pellets to dry hop,not that that means we all have to but their beers aren't too shabby.
Cheers

 

[clibit]

Yes, it's common practice to boil malt extract - it's not necessary to boil it, but it does no harm, other than darken it a little if you boil for a while. And it's a good way of getting hoppiness into your beer. If you dry hop as well you get the best of both worlds.

I've been meaning to try dry hopping with pellets for a while - must get on to it!

 

[BruinTuns]

One important question I forgot to ask is at what stage should the hops be added, and is it the same for dry hopping as for tea?
The only time I've done this was with the Evil Dog kit (hops came supplied) and the instructions were to add the tea a couple of days before fermentation finished. But that wouldn't work if I boil the hops in 3 litres of water and 500g dme, so should I just add it to the wort at the start of fermentation?

 

[Covrich]

One important question I forgot to ask is at what stage should the hops be added, and is it the same for dry hopping as for tea?
The only time I've done this was with the Evil Dog kit (hops came supplied) and the instructions were to add the tea a couple of days before fermentation finished. But that wouldn't work if I boil the hops in 3 litres of water and 500g dme, so should I just add it to the wort at the start of fermentation?

I think if you was to do that you'd do it at the start when it is wort and not beer.. Whereas dry hopping I would do a minus countdown from when I bottle.. So for example I am going to bottle my Youngs AAA on tuesday and I will dry hop say 4-5 days so will want to do that tomorrow or Friday

 

[clibit]

Does the Evil Dog kit instruct you to make a hop tea then?

 

[BruinTuns]

Hi Covrich. Yeah, I've just read something on the web that agrees with you re dry hopping. Apparently if added too early the hop aroma will be dissipated with the CO2 by bottling/kegging time.
Some brewers even prefer to wait until fermentation has finished.
Do you use a hop bag or loose? Pellets or leaves?

 

[BruinTuns]

Does the Evil Dog kit instruct you to make a hop tea then?

Yes, just a very simple steep. Two different hops were provided with the kit, already bagged just like tea.
Instructions say to soak them in a cup of boiling water for 10 minutes then add the whole lot, 'teabags' included, into the wort sometime between day 4 and day 7.
But they also recommend leaving the addition until 2-3 days before fermentation ceases for American craft beers which is a little confusing and makes a nonsense of '4-7 days' as this kit often takes over 3 weeks to ferment out.

 

[clibit]

I've forgotten what the question is! Is there a question? :)

I might try the hybrid evil dog hop tea / chuck the lot in the FV a few days before bottling thing.