Dry Hopping in Fermentor

Bubba Wade

Bubba Wade

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I have been brewing quite a while, but I have decided to start experimenting with dry hopping. For my current batch, I am making 2.5 gallons of a basic IPA. After the beer had dropped to a SG of about 1.020, I added 1/2 ounce of pellet hops to the fermenter, contained in a stainless mesh hop ball. I plan to leave this about 10 days and then keg. I have the temperature controlled to 66 degrees.

How does this approach compare to other's dry hopping techniques?
 
The first couple of times I dry hopped I put the hops in a muslin bag and stuffed it into the carboy. Getting the bag out was a b#tch! I have just tossed hops in since then with good results, but I often lose a half pint when siphoning. I recently purchased a couple of mesh hop tubes that have a rubber if on each end, but have not had the opportunity to brew since I got them. I will post some detail when I use them. Brewing next weekend so dry hop should be about a week after that.
 
Bubba Wade said:
I have been brewing quite a while, but I have decided to start experimenting with dry hopping. For my current batch, I am making 2.5 gallons of a basic IPA. After the beer had dropped to a SG
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That’s how I DH. I just throw pellets in the fermenter after about 4 days of fermentation. That way any air introduced is hopefully pushed out by further CO2 production. I wait about 7 or 8 days (increasing temp 1 degree per day for diacetyl cleanup from 64 to 68 for most beers) then cold crash for a day or two and keg.

I like adding DH during fermentation cuz it’s easy and less likely to introduce oxidation compared to adding DH to kegs.
 
Bubba Wade said:
I have been brewing quite a while, but I have decided to start experimenting with dry hopping. For my current batch, I am making 2.5 gallons of a basic IPA. After the beer had dropped to a SG of about 1.020, I added 1/2 ounce of pellet hops to the fermenter, contained in a stainless mesh hop ball. I plan to leave this about 10 days and then keg. I have the temperature controlled to 66 degrees.

How does this approach compare to other's dry hopping techniques?
Click to expand...
There's not a whole lot of science agreeing on what the best dry hopping technique is, so go for it and tell us how it comes out!
 
Bubba Wade said:
I have been brewing quite a while, but I have decided to start experimenting with dry hopping. For my current batch, I am making 2.5 gallons of a basic IPA. After the beer had dropped to a SG of about 1.020, I added 1/2 ounce of pellet hops to the fermenter, contained in a stainless mesh hop ball. I plan to leave this about 10 days and then keg. I have the temperature controlled to 66 degrees.

How does this approach compare to other's dry hopping techniques?
Click to expand...

This is very similar to how I dry hop. I wait until fermentation is about 80-85% complete and then carefully lower in a stainless hop filter tube. I've found that if I add a single stainless nut to the tube for added weight that the tube free-floats up and down from the bottom to the top of the fermentor and back throughout the remainder of fermentation. The science of dry hop biotransformation during fermentation is complicated and perhaps poorly understood at this point. In the past I was finding that I wasn't getting the quantity and quality of hop flavour I was looking for in my IPAs. Then I started doing hop stands and dry hopping during fermentation and that all changed for the better. I also used to just toss dry hops into the fermentor loose but now I always use a hop tube.
 
After cold crashing and adding gelatin, mine go into a muslin sack and thrown into the keg during transfer. I think I prefer the quality I get from hopping on clear beer. The beer isn't really drinkable for a couple of weeks but I welcome the conditioning time as I usually am getting them in the keg pretty quick. The hops stay in the keg until it is empty. I have never gotten any vegetal, grassy qualities that people warn of but I have only used up to 8 oz.

Just to offer up another way of doing things...
 
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I dump them into the fermenter after the gravity stops going down then I leave them in there for 5 days. I use pellets for dry hopping and whole cone for most of my boils (hop spider). I have just started using gelatin when I cold crash in the keg. Might start dropping a bag in there and hang it in a bag with dental floss like Bob does. Lots of bags on amazon for tea and aquarium carbon and they are dirt cheap.
 
Throw them in with out a bag blow some co2 into mix them very softly then displace the air with the co2 and close the lid, never fails.
 
Bubba Wade said:
I have been brewing quite a while, but I have decided to start experimenting with dry hopping. For my current batch, I am making 2.5 gallons of a basic IPA. After the beer had dropped to a SG of about 1.020, I added 1/2 ounce of pellet hops to the fermenter, contained in a stainless mesh hop ball. I plan to leave this about 10 days and then keg. I have the temperature controlled to 66 degrees.

How does this approach compare to other's dry hopping techniques?
Click to expand...
I usually add my pellet dry hop in muslin bags once the krausen drops and leave them in there for a minimum of 4 days.
There is a great exbeeriment about dry duration on brulosophy.
http://brulosophy.com/2015/10/26/dry-hop-length-long-vs-short-exbeeriment-results/
 
I always use a Secondary Fermentation, typically 4 to 8 days. I'm usually Crashing the temp at the same time. That's when I Dry Hop. I use fine mesh nylon bags which I sewed into 1-1/2" Tubes about 6" long.. I use Pellet Hops as they are easier to get into the Tubes & out of the Secondary Carboy. I use an SS Coupling to weight the Tubes. I have done a series of Tubes with the same Hops & I have used multiple Tubes with different Hops. I have never Dry Hopped in the Fermentor or the Keg. Throwing the pellets into the Primary or Secondary seems to cost me a Pint or more when I syphoned the beer to the Secondary or to the Keg, so it's Hop Bags/Tubes for me.
 
I also just toss in the pellets about the time the Krausen drops. After 3 to 7 days, depending on my demand for beer, I crash until clear and then keg. I've tried about every way you can think of and this is, by far, the simplest and cleanest procedure I've found.
 
My experiment with the SS mesh tubes did not go that well. Recipe was for 5oz dry hop, the tubes are supposed to be good for 2.5oz each, so in went 2.5oz in each tube. After racking to keg the tubes were a b@tch to clean, and the majority of the hops were pretty dry. The expected added taste and aroma were not there. The beer is still good but, in an effort to try and add some hop aroma and flavor I added 1oz to one of the tubes and popped into the keg. This helped, but it is still not as yummy as expected. My subsequent batch is a double dry hop, I have added the hop pellets loose this time. I would rather sacrifice a pint, and get the full effect of the hops.
 
After I retrieve the hop tube from the keg I think I will experiment with adding increasing amounts of hops to see what the true maximum amount is for these tubes.
 
Just circling back to this, for me the mesh tubes have been a failed experiment. Even with only 1oz of hops in one of these tubes the hops were mostly still pretty dry when cleaning. I will go back to tossing pellets into the fermenter. I will sacrifice a pint or so, but will get more hop bang for the hop buck.
 
Yep. Quit using the tube in fermenters. Got fair results, but no reason not to just toss the hops in, especially if you're gonna cold crash anyway. I do use the tube in a keg if I feel the beer needs a little help, suspending the tube a few inches off of the bottom.
 
Thanks Craig and Bob I was gunna upgrade to them stainless hop tubes from my little hop balls but looks like it might not be worth it after reading this thread.
 
Do you think you get more of the hop aroma and flavor in the fermenter by just throwing them in or using a bag or spider? I've only used a bag suspended in the primary so I was going to try throwing them in.
 
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