Hop Flavour Fade

[MyQul]

I mostly make dark beers although I do enjoy a bitter. I made a standard/ordinary bitter a couple of months ago (bottled on the 5/10/15) following the reciepe for Gales Butser Bitter from BYOBRA and instead of Goldings used First Gold hops for the first time. Apart from needing some more water adjustment tweeking it was really nice.

About 10 days/two weeks ago I noticed the hop flavour had completly disappeared. Where had it gone? How could it escape from sealed bottles? Because I don't often make pales I was a bit confused so took to google to try and find out what was going on.

Most of the info I found was from American forums and typically dealt with big IPA's with massive hop charges. But after a bit of reading I discovered that hop aroma/flavour does and will fade, especially with ipa. They're particularly designed to drink young.

The next bittler I will be making is the Yorkshire bitter recipe from GH's book and what I have discovered to try to combat hop fade, from my reading is:

-After carbing up, refridgerate/keep the beer cold. This helps preserve the volitile oils. Unfortunatley I have nowhere to keep 200 bottles (plus mini kegs) cold long term so will just have to do the following....
- Drink the beer young. Before the volitile flavour/aroma oils disapear. Fortunately I definately have NO problem with this. I usually cant brew fast enough to keep up with the rate I drink it :grin:
- Get more hop flavour into my bitters so it lasts longer. The recipe I followed used about 9-10g for flavour addition. People like clibit and SteveJ are dusting that amount off they're fingers after shovelling 300g into their hop bombs. So the recommendations I read, which I will be trying are; extra hops in at flame out. Add a hop tea at bottling time.

What are your experiances with 'hop fade?'

(As for the few bottles of First Gold Bitter I have left rather than pouring them down the sink I'm going to have a go a dry hopping the bottles,something which I have'nt done before, to see if that makes them drinkable again)

 

[rodabod]

What about oxygenation? I guess that must have some effect. I find that the hop freshness fades/softens, but sometimes it can be an improvement.

 

[MyQul]

What about oxygenation? I guess that must have some effect. I find that the hop freshness fades/softens, but sometimes it can be an improvement.

How exactly do you mean? Of the hops (storage)? Of the beer during conditioning?

Oxygenation was touched upon during my reading but noone seemed to go into it in any depth

 

[Cwrw666]

Isn't this just normal conditioning? Flavours mingle, everything mellows, unstable molecules break down. Basically if it's `fresh hoppy' flavours you're after like craft beer IPAs then you have to drink them young - and most comercially produced beer is quite young when you drink it.

 

[rodabod]

Well, we (well, I) don't purge my bottles/vessels with CO2 before packaging, so not only does the headspace contain oxygen, but the liquor mixes with oxygen as we dispense, even if we do use contraptions like bottling wands. I think it must have some effect, but how significant it is, I don't know.

 

[MyQul]

Isn't this just normal conditioning? Flavours mingle, everything mellows, unstable molecules break down. Basically if it's `fresh hoppy' flavours you're after like craft beer IPAs then you have to drink them young - and most comercially produced beer is quite young when you drink it.

It might be but the bitter has absolutely zero hop flavour now just bitterness rather then a more mellow/muted hop flavour

 

[MyQul]

Well, we (well, I) don't purge my bottles/vessels with CO2 before packaging, so not only does the headspace contain oxygen, but the liquor mixes with oxygen as we dispense, even if we do use contraptions like bottling wands. I think it must have some effect, but how significant it is, I don't know.

Ah, I see. I agree. I thinking oxygen will have a an effect on the volitile flavour oils

 

[TartanSpecial]

What are your experiances with 'hop fade?'

I've normally drunk my beers within 6 or 7 months but I still have a few bottles of a simple extract pale ale with modest (50grm) hopping with Willamette brewed almost exactly a year ago. I have noticed that the hop aroma and flavour have faded significantly over the last 2 months....but luckily only a couple of bottles left, and its not unpleasant, just not as good as it was.

 

[simon12]

I can't help but can confirm I have had the same thing it was most noticeable in a single hop chinook beer I made last year, was a nice beer the all of a sudden a week later (about 2 months after bottling) it went totally tasteless. I have made other beers this didn't seem to happen to but this one and a few others it did.

 

[MyQul]

I can't help but can confirm I have had the same thing it was most noticeable in a single hop chinook beer I made last year, was a nice beer the all of a sudden a week later (about 2 months after bottling) it went totally tasteless. I have made other beers this didn't seem to happen to but this one and a few others it did.

As far as I can work out my beer flavour faded so quickly because there wasn't much hop additon (9g-10g) and I store at room temp. Do you rember the hop addtion amounts and what temp did you store your beer at?

 

[Speccy]

Well, we (well, I) don't purge my bottles/vessels with CO2 before packaging, so not only does the headspace contain oxygen, but the liquor mixes with oxygen as we dispense, even if we do use contraptions like bottling wands. I think it must have some effect, but how significant it is, I don't know.

I used to worry about oxgen sneaking in during the bottling process, but then realised the yeast must surely eat up any stray O2 along with the priming sugar while carbonating the beer. Oxygen in the headspace is presumably only an issue for commercial beers that are filtered/pasteurised and then force-carbonated, which is why those tend to be purged with CO2 before capping. That's what I reckon, anyway.

 

[clibit]

A 9-10g flavour addition is asking for trouble. :lol:

Not much hop flavour to start off with.

 

[MyQul]

A 9-10g flavour addition is asking for trouble. :lol:

Not much hop flavour to start off with.

Thats what I kind of thought. But the amount seems appropriate to the recipe as the OG is only 1.034. Guess it's a beer best drunk young

 

[clibit]

Breweries of ale in the UK seem geared to cask ale, which is served very fresh and often has dry hops in the cask. The low hopping rates in English beers partly reflect this, I suspect, but also the emphasis on malts flavours in English beers, and yeast to some extent. I reckon if you are keeping beer longer than a month or so you may well need to up the hops.

 

[MyQul]

Breweries of ale in the UK seem geared to cask ale, which is served very fresh and often has dry hops in the cask. The low hopping rates in English beers partly reflect this, I suspect, but also the emphasis on malts flavours in English beers, and yeast to some extent. I reckon if you are keeping beer longer than a month or so you may well need to up the hops.

Ah, I see. I'm so used to dark beers and them not coming to there best for at least 4-6 weeks I was quite surprised when I found the bitter had lost it's flavour in such a short space of time. Thanks to you (and other forumites) for the insight into how young, beers in pubs when served, actually are. My mindset is so 'home brew' I kind of forgot that breweries aren't really going to be conditioning beers for 6 weeks before sending them out to pubs
As I mentioned in the OP, in future I'll be adding flavour additions at flame out and before packaging to my bitters from now on

 

[rodabod]

I used to worry about oxgen sneaking in during the bottling process, but then realised the yeast must surely eat up any stray O2 along with the priming sugar while carbonating the beer. Oxygen in the headspace is presumably only an issue for commercial beers that are filtered/pasteurised and then force-carbonated, which is why those tend to be purged with CO2 before capping. That's what I reckon, anyway.

This is a very good point. Thankyou.

 

[mike77]

I do mainly pale ales and tend to drink them young and I think it suits the style. If the flavour is a bit rough then I'll hold off a bit and hope it conditions out. I've got two beers I'll be drinking tonight. One is 13 days old and the other is 6

 

[dad_of_jon]

definitely add more hops to reduce the hop fade. 6-8 weeks from bottling is the sweet spot i've found but I have located my last bottle of orang-no-tang? Whoa! which was bottled on the 25/05/2015. That had 100g of citra in addition to whatever was in the brewmaker ipa kit. will report back tomorrow on how the hops have fared! :grin:

 

[simon12]

I just checked the recipe and nothing like my memory, it had 25g EKG 60 min 25G amarillo 20 & 10 min & would have been stored at room temp.

 

[dad_of_jon]

Well, I can still taste more citra in my 5 month old bottle of orang-no-tang? Whoa! than I've had in a bottle of Oakham ales's Citra.

So the hops are still there, not as sharp or as up front as they once were. It's still a good pint it's just different, You'd still be able to tell it was the same recipe. If you're starting your hop adventure an older beer might not be such a hop shock and work your way up to drinking them younger & younger :grin: