Hops Advice

[andywilde16]

Hi,
I am not sure if this is the correct forum to be posting this to but I am in need of some advice of the addition of Hops.

I am currently brewing a Ritchies Simply Yorkshire Bitter kit (wort started last night) and I am wondering whether to use some Dry Hops to give the final beer some additional flavour?

I was thinking of using Fuggle hops (other varieties ideas welcomed) and would welcome some advice on this and also at what point to dry hop the wort?

Thanks in advance for all advice.

 

[Covrich]

Go for it , you could use any English variety fuggles East Kent Goldings first choice ect whatever you have really.. I would wait until fermentation is fully completed before adding thr dry hop and personally I would have it in there for a minimum of 5 days so add it the number of days before you wish to bottle/keg.

 

[andywilde16]

Thanks Covrich, I do not have any hops at present so looking to buy some.

I was planning on around 8 days in the FV before bottling as long as fermentation has completed so I was thinking of dry hopping Thursday evening?

Is it easy to Dry Hop and should I be buying pellets or flowers (what quantity do I need)?

Thanks!

 

[Simonh82]

Personally I prefer using pellets to dry hop and I just chuck them into the fermentation vessel and give it a very gentle stir. If you leave them in there for a few days they should naturally sink down to the bottom of the vessel but it would help the hops and yeast drop out of suspension if you can get the temperature down, so moving it to a shed or unheated garage would speed up this process. Then just rack the beer off the top of the yeast/hops leaving them behind in the vessel. Depending on how careful you are when racking the beer, there is a chance that you would get a very small amount of hop debris in you bottles but I do mean very small amount and compared to the yeast sediment it is not noticeable.

If you want to keep the beer English in style Fuggle would work well, I also think First Gold work well for dry hopping. Alternatively you could go for an American hop to give it a fruity/citrusy hit.

 

[Covrich]

+1 for Pellets, I actually prefer pellets in general.

 

[Leon103]

There is no right or wrong way to add them. Too date I have been using a hop bag and leaving them at 14c like brewdog but this link is a good read.

http://www.port66.co.uk/dry-hopping/

 

[braziliain]

As above. I recently used East Kent Goldings to dry hop an English pale ale and it is delicious.

I used pellets in a small hop sock so that the hop debris didn't end up in the bottles. The hop sock was weighed down with some glass marbles which I boiled for a few minutes along with the sock to sterilise. I put them in 10 days into fermentation (after everything had died down) and left them in for 5 days before bottling.

I'll definitely be doing it again! :thumb:

 

[andywilde16]

Thanks for the advice - I am thinking of Fuggles Hops in pellet form and will add them around 5 days before I am ready to bottle the brew.

I will probably use a hop bag as I do not want to risk getting any hop residue into the bottles - Brazilian did I read correctly you use a sock (boiled and sterilised) as a hop bag?

The bags of pellets are 100grams - would you put them all into the 23litre wort?

 

[Godsdog]

here is my dry hopping regime in a stainless steel coffee pot I picked up for 50pence on the local bricabac market after 5 days of fermentation
first I boil up half a coffee cup of water to steralise with the ss teaball inside then I chuck it down the sink then I do same again then cold crash the boiling water in a bowl of cold water until I reach 70 degrees then add the ball full of pellet hops to it and for twenty minutes I keep going back periodically and firing the gas ring to maintain the 70 degrees then I cold crash it again to luke warm and empty the hop tea in the FV and hang the teaball full of hops in the FV on dental floss below the surface of the wort for a further 5 days minimum :thumb:

 

[terrym]

Hi,
I am not sure if this is the correct forum to be posting this to but I am in need of some advice of the addition of Hops.

I am currently brewing a Ritchies Simply Yorkshire Bitter kit (wort started last night) and I am wondering whether to use some Dry Hops to give the final beer some additional flavour?

I was thinking of using Fuggle hops (other varieties ideas welcomed) and would welcome some advice on this and also at what point to dry hop the wort?

Thanks in advance for all advice.

Try this for basic info on dry hopping.
A Newbies Guide to Dry Hopping Your Beer - The HomeBrew Forum

Fuggles, Goldings both good for dry hopping. First Gold is a little different but I like it. And for something a bit different still, Styrian Goldings which is often used by commercial brewers (e.g. TT Landlord).
I suggest you go for 50g dry hop to start with. 25g sometimes gets a bit lost and more than 50g may be a bit too much. When you have done it a few times you get to know what suits you best.

This supplier is good for buying small quantities.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/100g-Hop-...hash=item3d2e3dea23:m:mcOqobTg4KGn3nKiynHQbGw

PS There are are two types of 'hop bag' generally in use. The first is a bag in which to put the hops, usually made of muslin or nylon. Up to a point bigger is better since bigger allows the hops to disperse more and so give up their goodness more efficiently. I prefer nylon because muslin tends to soak up the beer and nylon doesn't. The second type is more a small sock that fits over the the end of the siphon tube (if you use one) to act as a filter, and this allows you to chuck the hops directly into the brew for maximum contact.

 

[braziliain]

Thanks for the advice - I am thinking of Fuggles Hops in pellet form and will add them around 5 days before I am ready to bottle the brew.

I will probably use a hop bag as I do not want to risk getting any hop residue into the bottles - Brazilian did I read correctly you use a sock (boiled and sterilised) as a hop bag?

The bags of pellets are 100grams - would you put them all into the 23litre wort?

Sorry, didn't mean to confuse! It's a 'hop sock' I have. Just a small mesh bag with a drawstring which is intended for containing hops. A small muslin tied up would do the same thing. I grabbed mine for a few pence from the local homebrew shop.

I worked on a ratio of 30g for a 23L brew. I actually had 7.5L in my fermenter so used 30/23 x 7.5 = 10g
It turned out lovely :thumb:

 

[andywilde16]

Thanks I think I will go for somewhere between 30g-50grams of pellets in a muslin bag not packed in too tightly to allow them to grow slightly!

I am going to introduce them once the krausen has started to disappear and then leave them in there for around 5 days before I bottle to secondary ferment.

 

[Thatsmyleg]

I've been wondering about this recently. Some of the hops I've been buying has come as pellets inside what is essentially a giant teabag. It keeps the residue out of the boil, but the tea bags sit on the surface, making me wonder if it isn't a very efficient way of distributing the flavour. Is there a flavour/residue trade-off with putting pellets directly into your beer rather than containing them in some kind of bag?