Excess ingredients...

[Paul Egan]

Hi All,

First post and perhaps a question that I already know the answer to but I thought that I'd ask anyhow.

I brew a little bit. Not as much as I would like but I really don't have the space or set-up yet, but I'll still get around to producing something every couple of months. The process usually involves me finding a recipe in a book or on-line, ordering the ingredients and getting to it. But each time I do this I end up with unused hops which generally come in bags of 100g but at time I only need 15g for a 23L batch. The rest just sit in the bottom of my freezer for months until I forget about them.
Is there a method of managing excess hops that I should be using? Should I look at my stash every so often and choose my next beer to maximise what I have in stock rather than ordering in new supplies. And if this is the case is there a tool that I could use where when I enter in what I have it tells me what beers I could possibly produce (ignoring malt and yeast inputs for the time being)?

Would it work if I were to join a club and take excess along to even give to others? Is this something that's done in the UK?

 

[Wilfy]

I have a spreadsheet with my 'stock'. I plan brews around this and book items out as I use them.

 

[Alside101]

Or use a recipe builder like the 1 at http://www.geterbrewed.com and buy what you need

 

[Leon103]

I use beersmith to track my inventory. Where are you buying your hops? Plenty of places do smaller packets.

 

[GerritT]

Hi All,

First post and perhaps a question that I already know the answer to but I thought that I'd ask anyhow.

I brew a little bit. Not as much as I would like but I really don't have the space or set-up yet, but I'll still get around to producing something every couple of months. The process usually involves me finding a recipe in a book or on-line, ordering the ingredients and getting to it. But each time I do this I end up with unused hops which generally come in bags of 100g but at time I only need 15g for a 23L batch. The rest just sit in the bottom of my freezer for months until I forget about them.
Is there a method of managing excess hops that I should be using? Should I look at my stash every so often and choose my next beer to maximise what I have in stock rather than ordering in new supplies. And if this is the case is there a tool that I could use where when I enter in what I have it tells me what beers I could possibly produce (ignoring malt and yeast inputs for the time being)?

Would it work if I were to join a club and take excess along to even give to others? Is this something that's done in the UK?

My methods:
-vacuum sealer
-old stuff goes first
-sometimes I old bittering hops so I don't have to buy fresh
-https://www.crossmyloofbrew.co.uk/online-store/25g-Hop-Pellet-Tea-Bags-from-p85504204

 

[Simonh82]

I design my recipes to use full 100g amounts. In general this works OK as I like hoppy beers. If I were making a lot of milds or lagers I'd probably need to think of a better way of storing things long term. For bittering hops I just use one or two varieties rather than using whatever a recipe might suggest.

 

[Clint]

I have a "user upper" brew style depending on what I have. Help by the bucket full off this very forum. Beer been fine!

 

[Poochops]

I had a freezer drawer full of packets of half used cones and pellets so I wrote a list and targeted using some of them up. I brewed hoppy IPAs swapping some recipe hops for similar ones in the freezer. Next I rounded a lot, 20g too much or too little just ignore the over, or throw in something similar for the under. Ones I can't do without I order in smaller quants from CML.
It's a lot tidier in there now but next time I do an IPA I plan to have a final blitz and throw the kitchen sink in, that'll just leave me with about 400g of magnum cones to work through for bittering.

 

[jceg316]

As others have mentioned I also keep a stock check on Excel, I'm happy to share my template if this is of interest.

However I'm moving to a smaller flat soon so I'll be using up all my ingredients and moving forward buying from Geter Brew's recipe builder.

 

[Paul Egan]

Thanks for all your suggestions!

It looks like I'm going to have to keep stock in a spreadsheet and as Clint said, brew a user-upper every so often. I'll use the forum to see if someone can come up with something based on what I have.

Geter brewed is a pretty good solution and I think I'll give them a go next time and see what I get sent. There's perhaps a few hops that I have in the feezer that they don't stock but that's not the end of the world.

 

[Clint]

If you're rubbish on computers like me do a handwritten sheet and mark off what you use. Keep it in the cover of your favourite brew book then it's easy when plotting your next few brews.