How to use hops

[Desmnd]

Hi. I used to make beer the proper way with all the ingredients including the hops. You had to turn the temperature up to boil the hops for about 30-60 minutes. Dave lines make beer like those you buy).

When you use tins, you pore the molasse into a bucket and clean the tins out with boiling water. What I want to do is get good quality hops and boil some of them in water, then empty that into the tins. This way I can have a play around with the flavours of the standard tinned stuff. My problem is, the hops come in aluminium sealed foil and are about 100g. I don’t think I will need all of that so my question really is, can I re seal the remainder and freeze the hops or put the hops in the fridge? It could be months before I use the rest of the hops.

Thanks

Desmond.

 

[Speccy]

Hi. I used to make beer the proper way with all the ingredients including the hops. You had to turn the temperature up to boil the hops for about 30-60 minutes. Dave lines make beer like those you buy).

When you use tins, you pore the molasse into a bucket and clean the tins out with boiling water. What I want to do is get good quality hops and boil some of them in water, then empty that into the tins. This way I can have a play around with the flavours of the standard tinned stuff. My problem is, the hops come in aluminium sealed foil and are about 100g. I don’t think I will need all of that so my question really is, can I re seal the remainder and freeze the hops or put the hops in the fridge? It could be months before I use the rest of the hops.

Thanks

Desmond.

You certainly can. Squeeze the air out of the foil packs, make them as airtight as you can with tape, and they'll keep fine in the freezer for a few weeks or months.

 

[Desmnd]

Thanks for that. My favourites at the moment are St Peters red ruby ale (red beer obviously) and Brupacks Skelmsdale dark a very dark possibly porter). I am looking at hop shop Devon and they supply and they supply lots of hops in categories: Aroma, Bittering and Dual purpose. I was also given free-bees. From Bruepacks with names like Sorachi Ace, Wai-iti and southern cross.

Not sure about the different types only that Goulding’s, fugles and Hallertau come under Aroma. So any help on these ones that I have and complementary hops that I could use.

Thanks again for your help.

Desmond.

 

[Speccy]

Back in my kit brewing days I had good results from dry hopping (adding hops directly to the fermenter after a few days, once the main fermentation is complete).

You're only looking to get flavour/aroma from the hops, not bitterness, as the tins already have plenty of that. So it would be best not to boil them for any length of time. Go for aroma hops and either add them straight to the fermenter or make a hop tea, so you keep all those lovely flavours.

Goldings is a solid choice for dry hopping British-style beers, while your Wai-iti would be great in a pale ale. It's hard to go wrong, and you could always experiment by splitting the batch and trying different hops in each half.

 

[Desmnd]

Okay don't boil them for a long time. 10 mins? But they would have to be boiled for some time at least. Adding them in at room temperature would not have much effect or would it?

I agree to mixing the hops and this would be a test. It would be great if hops had tasting notes like wines do.

 

[soupdragon]

Have a read of this, might give you some guidance

https://kegthat.com/guide-to-dry-hopping/
Cheers Tom