For the love of hops

[Twostage]

Currently reading 'for the love of hops'. Interesting read but you need to concentrate. It's a mixture of facts and anecdotes and gives plenty of food for thought. I'm about a third of the way through so this is not a complete review, I'll add more as I go on. Some interesting bits so far:-

I've always thought of hops as either bittering or aroma (thats how they are described) but you need to think that the aroma hops are also flavour hops.

The big brewers needed consistency and this effectively held back the diversity of commercially available hop breeds. A lot of hop growers are now giving early batches to craft brewers to experiment with. As they tend to be looking for something 'different' this is diversifying the market.

Citra took ages to be accepted as it was considered too strong, in fact many who tried it didn't like it at all. Quite by chance I had a citra single hop pale last night (M&S) and I know what he means. If I was just looking for a 'nice' flavour I'd reject it.

I'm tempted to make an ale (no hops) just to see what it's like.

I'm also wondering if I could get away with an 18 foot bine growing up the front of the house. (We're a bit too far north anyway apparently).:grin:

 

[MyQul]

I'm tempted to make an ale (no hops) just to see what it's like.

It'll be exceptionally sweet, cloyingly so. What you might want to try is use other herbs and spice instead of hops, such as guit

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gruit

 

[Twostage]

Yes, gruit is an area for research for me now. Seemed strange that a mixture of herbs could be licensed. Going to do some digging.

There was another point in the book that adding hops to ale meant that it could be brewed weaker and keep longer which made it cheaper. So palates adapted to it. It sort of implies that there could be something else that takes over from hops.

 

[HebridesRob]

I made a small pale malt only brew once, quite early in my "career". The end result wasn't unpleasant, it was just a bit "meh". Like a cheap rich tea biscuit.

 

[Twostage]

Finished it (and another in the series). Not an easy read but worth it. I think for me one of the best bits is the different methods breweries use to dry hop, when, how, quantities. I'd never dry hopped (I wish it was called cold hopped) before reading this book, did an experiment with a Turbo Beer and it was a real improvement, almost too good.

Anyway, an interesting insight into all things hop.