Hop Tea Question.

[Alexislife]

Right, I've never done a hop tea before but thinking of doing this as opposed to dry hopping my latest batch. This is due to the fact I brew away from home so don't have easy access to the FV and I refuse to pay someone £12 plus the cost of hops to dryhop it for me (granted for that cost they would send me a gravity reading but in my opinion the less people that interfere with my beer the better).

So the process sounds simple if I have it correct:

1. Boil Water then let it cool to about 70c
2. Add hops to water
3. Steep hops for 15-20 minutes
4. Filter liquid from the ops and add to FV or Bottling bucket

Is that pretty much the gist of it?

I've read various pieces of people suggesting to use a cafetiere which sounds sensible but was also wondering if anyone's used an aeropress, I'm figuring that as I mostly use pellets this would help filter out any bits and pieces better?

Lastly sorry if there's a thread on this already, I did search but it kept coming up blank.

 

[MyQul]

Yup that's basically it.

I had to google what aeropress was. I guess it would be fine if it works like a cafetiere. I just use a seive

 

[GlentoranMark]

When I last hopped a kit I just chucked the lot into the FV. The hops settled to the bottom.

 

[MyQul]

When I last hopped a kit I just chucked the lot into the FV. The hops settled to the bottom.

True, you could do this. But I've done some experimentation with leaving hops flavouring in the FV for two weeks and on some of the beers I did it, they trurned out soapy and took ages to condition out.

I think it may have been to do with how much hops you chuck in there and possibly how flocctuant the yeast is

 

[Alexislife]

Yup that's basically it.

I had to google what aeropress was. I guess it would be fine if it works like a cafetiere. I just use a seive

Great! Is there any sort of hop to water ratio that I should be aware of?

The aeropress makes espresso style coffee without a big fancy machine so I'm hoping it might get a little more out of the hops overall as I'll be forcing the water through them under pressure.

 

[MyQul]

No hop to water ratio that I'm aware of. I've always just added my hops, no matter the amount to 1L of water and added 1L less of top up water to my concentrated wort so I hit my correct brew length at bottling time.

I notice in the piccy's of the aero press that they have some sort of filter paper. The hop debris may clogg it up as the paper filters may be too fine? You wont know until you try though

 

[geetee]

The only time I did this was for my slovenian pale ale and I put the hops in water cooled below 80°C, sieved and added to the priming sugar solution and in the bottling bucket. I wanted to add as late as possible before bottling to retain the maximum benefit!

 

[Alexislife]

Yeah I was just thinking about the paper disk but I'm thinking I could stick he hop pellets in my coffee grinder first, this in theory would then increase the surface area of the hop that the water is in contact with and increase utilisation.

 

[MyQul]

If your using pellets, I've alway found they disintigrate fairly soon after putting them in the water so there's no need to grind them to increase surface area as it happens anyway

 

[Alexislife]

When I last hopped a kit I just chucked the lot into the FV. The hops settled to the bottom.

This is what I did when brewing at home but now I have to travel an hour to the place that I brew.

Plus I like the idea of not loosing a couple of bottles to the additional hops.

 

[Alexislife]

Think I'll do a test run prior to bottling day with a small amount of hops to see how it works out.

 

[MyQul]

Seems the way to go. If it doesnt work with the aeropress a seive works fine

 

[MyQul]

Just out of curiosity, where do you brew if you dont brew at home?

 

[Alexislife]

Just out of curiosity, where do you brew if you dont brew at home?

I've been brewing at UBrew since May, although I've yet to have a batch that hasn't got infected 2-3 weeks after bottling. They're blaming someone using some brett/wild yeast and have finally replaced all the hoses this week after many complaints.

 

[MyQul]

I used to buy my grains from their as it's only a mile or two from me, but then I switched to buying online

 

[Alexislife]

Ubrew is a fantastic idea but I can't help but feel a little like they've been a victim of their own success.

They're starting to update stuff and make some overdue changes but I think up until recently it could have been managed better. They're not overly transparent or consistent with their pricing either. Few weeks go I bought a can of Magic Rock - Cannonball whilst brewing on a Saturday and they charged me £6, I'd bought the same beer from them the day before when bottling and only been charged £3.50. When I queried it they just told me they'd got the price wrong the day before and I was lucky that I got a bargain.

 

[MyQul]

The disorganisation was why I went to online shopping. I always had to wait 20-30 mins before they could serve me because they were ususually so busy.

I always used to raise an eyebrow at the cost of their draught beers too. It would be �£5 or so for a 330ml glass (although the beers were usually quite strong at normally around 6%abv) that would be half full of head

 

[dan125]

Seems the way to go. If it doesnt work with the aeropress a seive works fine

I'd like to try a hop tea soon - does a sieve work ok even with hop pellets?

 

[chub1]

The disorganisation was why I went to online shopping. I always had to wait 20-30 mins before they could serve me because they were ususually so busy.

I always used to raise an eyebrow at the cost of their draught beers too. It would be ���£5 or so for a 330ml glass (although the beers were usually quite strong at normally around 6%abv) that would be half full of head

�£5 for a 330ml

As for the original question, i have made hop teas (when i was doing kits) in a caffatiere. Boiled the water, put the pellets in and stuck the water in, pressed and left:thumb:. Not bothered since though.

 

[MyQul]

I'd like to try a hop tea soon - does a sieve work ok even with hop pellets?

Yeas, very well,I rarely use leaf. A very small amount of the debris gos through but not much at all