How to... Dry Hop a Beer

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onelegout

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This guide is taken from my brewing blog, http://www.brewing-tips.com. If you liked it, check out the blog for more tips and tricks!

What is Dry Hopping?

Dry Hopping is a technique used by brewers to increase the hop aroma in their beer. Usually hops are boiled with the wort to give it bitterness and aroma, however much of the aroma from the hops is lost by boiling them, so dry-hopping adds the aroma that cannot be extracted from the hops during the boil. Many inexperienced home-brewers come across recipes that call for ‘dry hopping’ and do not understand how the process works. Dry hopping is actually a very simple technique which can give your beer greater depth of flavour and aroma with very little work.

hops1.jpg


How do you ‘dry hop’ a beer?

To dry hop your beer, simply add the amount of hops specified in your recipe at the beginning of secondary fermentation.
1. Ferment the beer as usual until it has finished primary fermentation (take a hydrometer reading and ensure that the beer has reached its final gravity).
2. Using a racking cane and auto-syphon, transfer the beer to an empty, sanitised fermentation vessel being careful not to suck up any of the yeast sediment at the bottom of the beer.
3. Add your hops to the beer – either just chuck them in loose, or put them in a hop sock or muslin bag.
4. Leave for at least 3 days.
5. Using a racking cane and auto-syphon, transfer the beer to a sanitised fermentation vessel before bottling or kegging. Try not to suck up any of the hops during this step, as they will be present in the final beer if you do!

Do you have to boil the hops first?

No. Hops are a natural preservative and do not need to be boiled before being added to the fermenting beer. If you are using a hop sock or muslin bag, you may want to boil that to sanitise it first.

Which hops should you use for dry hopping?


Dry hopping does not add bitterness to the beer, but it does add the aromatic oils that are lost when the hops are boiled. Therefore the best hops for dry hopping are aroma hops with low Alpha Acid content. All of the noble hop varieties including Hallertau, Tettnanger, and Saaz are great for dry-hopping.
 
Good tutorial thanks. The beer that I have made did not have dry hopping in the recipe, but after reading your tutorial I believe that a hoppy aroma would improve it, as such would say 10 grams of fuggles in a 5 gallon batch be OK.

David
 
I'm sure it would be fine, the more hops the better though - it's a great way to use up slightly older hops. Remember that it will not impart bitterness so you do not have to include it in the AA/IBU calculations.
 
It certainly isn't a "good way of using old hops". If you are wanting to impart some hop flavour and aroma through dry hopping you will want to use the freshest, stinkingest and stickiest most resinous hops you can get your hands on. Alpha acid doesnt have to be low either this is a common misconception that arose from the harshness of some high alpha hops like target which can impart a hasrshnes which some people find unpleasant (some but not all). Hops like columbus alpha 16% are amazing for dry hopping. fresh and sticky they impart deep orange marmaladey aromas along with punchy citrus and ruby red grapefruit lovliness.
i would try at least 30 g of hops for dryhopping but in my recipes sometimes go as high as 200 to get that lipsmacking hop twang i crave incessantly.
 
Fogive my noviceness but can I dry hop a beer kit? I assume if I can I would use them towards the end of my first fermentation in my fv prior to syphoning into my bottling bucket. I am currently brewing a Woodfords Norfolk wherry best bitter kit.
 
YeandAle said:
Fogive my noviceness but can I dry hop a beer kit? I assume if I can I would use them towards the end of my first fermentation in my fv prior to syphoning into my bottling bucket. I am currently brewing a Woodfords Norfolk wherry best bitter kit.
Absolutely, dry hopping is a great way to "pep up" a kit :thumb:
 
tubby_shaw said:
YeandAle said:
Fogive my noviceness but can I dry hop a beer kit? I assume if I can I would use them towards the end of my first fermentation in my fv prior to syphoning into my bottling bucket. I am currently brewing a Woodfords Norfolk wherry best bitter kit.
Absolutely, dry hopping is a great way to "pep up" a kit :thumb:

Interesting, would be nice to add my own touch to a kit. How do I go about this and does anyone know of a relavant post?
 
So I take it the secondry fermentation is when I am ready to syphon into my bottling bucket? I assume I am ok to leave my brew in the bottling bucket for the 3 days with the hops in?
 
its not ideal really. the presence of all the extra yeast will lessen the impact of the dry hop. It will work like this though just to a lesser extent. However it would be best to put the beer into a second bin, dryhop it here (i find between one to two weeks normally gets the most out of the hops without geting too grassy) and then move the beer into a third and final container, your bottling bin.
 
Mephistopholes said:
its not ideal really. the presence of all the extra yeast will lessen the impact of the dry hop. It will work like this though just to a lesser extent. However it would be best to put the beer into a second bin, dryhop it here (i find between one to two weeks normally gets the most out of the hops without geting too grassy) and then move the beer into a third and final container, your bottling bin.

So i ferment as normal (10 days or so or untill the hydrometer has a constant reading) and the move beer into another bucket with hops in a bag, wait 2 weeks and then syphon into a bottling bucket and bottle?

It sounds like a long time to be leaving the beer before bottling :wha:
 
Its fine. It'll give the yeasts a little time to mellow out clean the beer up and leave some cleaner tasting beer for the hops to shine. ideally you should try and dry hop somewhere a little cooler if possible just so the yeast can fully clean up and drop out.
 
Mephistopholes said:
Its fine. It'll give the yeasts a little time to mellow out clean the beer up and leave some cleaner tasting beer for the hops to shine. ideally you should try and dry hop somewhere a little cooler if possible just so the yeast can fully clean up and drop out.

Thanks Meph,

At the moment I'am brewing in the kitchen on a stone floor at about 21 degrees ambient. What sort of temp do I want to be aiming for?
 
Hi,

Going to dry hop my next kit, and I've never done this before. It is a woodfordes kit, Great Eastern Golden Ale.

Question 1 - i bought 50g of non vacuum packed hops yesterday. I am not going to need these for 2 weeks, will they have lost all their flavour by this point? I think they were Goldings. Should I chuck em?

Question 2 - I got a small bag of hop pellets with a Brupaks Wheat beer kit, i am not going to use them for the wheat beer, should i just lob them in with the hops above?

Question 3 - What is a racking cane and auto syphon? I normally syphon the beer, but i wouldn't say it was 'auto' as it involves me sucking the tub then placing the tap in the barrell/bottle. Do i need extra equipment to dry hop?

Cheers
 
Easy ones first!

A racking cane is just a piece of rigid tubing with either the bottom end upturned or a cup on the bottom that basically allows you to syphon from the bottom of a FV without sucking up loads of yeast. Check out the sponsors' sites, they all sell them. An "auto syphon" is one where you don't have to suck on the end; they usually involve and tube inside a tube or somthing. Again, all the sponsors will sell these ;)

Dry hopping. You only want to dry hop if you feel your recipe needs a bit more hop flavour/aroma, but you need to be sure what flavours you want in there. There are loads of hops out there with different characters i.e citrus, pine, floral, oniony, cat pee, etc etc. With the goldings, they might be OK - as a certain amount of oxidation of the hop oils can be beneficial for aroma. Give them a smell, if they don't smell fresh and lovely, bin them :thumb:

Make sure you store your hops in the freezer to keep them fresh, also.

Have a listen to this: http://thebrewingnetwork.com/shows/Brew-Strong/Brew-Strong-12-08-08-Dry-Hopping
 
Ceejay

Thanks for the reply. I don't know anything about hops, though i do know I like exceedingly hoppy beer, especially a light golden hoppy beer.

I'll have a listen to that link later, cheers, and I'll put my hops in the freezer.

How much should i use? i've 50g of goldings, and small pack of the pellets (haven't weighed these, guess 20g?) from my Brupaks Wheat Beer kit. Should I just whack it all in? Do I need more?
 
According to those dudes in the podcast, 50g in 5 gallons should be adequate. I reckon if the goldings smell good still, dump 'em in :thumb:
 

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