Beer Forum

Hey All,
I am about to do my first dry hopping, as I have been unimpressed with my beers' aromas thus far. I have an ounce of whole cascade hops that I'm going to use in a "hop sock" on a summer wheat beer about to go into secondary. Just a few questions, probably pretty obvious stuff.
1) As for sanitation, do Is boiling the hop sock in water for a few minuites good to sanitize it?
2) Do I need to do anything to the hops first, or just open, put in the sock, and add to the carboy?
3) Is it true that I only want to add the dry hops when fermentation is totally done? Or do I want it to drop a few points while the hops are in there?
4) 7 days seems to be a common number for dry hopping, any differing opinions?
5) Do I bottle immediately after removing the dry hops, or let it sit a while longer?

any and all dry hop wisdom is appreciated

I have seen anywhere from 5 day to 3 weeks of dry hopping. Everything else you asked, I think you answered yourself.
As far as removing them, I would personally move the fermenter to the location you plan on racking from it. Remove your hops and let it sit for a day to settle out from the removal of the hops and from the act of moving the fermenter. That's just me, and I aint no expert.
Boiling the bag will be fine, and practice normal sanitation. Many people say that the alcohol in the beer keeps the bugs away, but it is nice to stick to a routine when it comes to sanitation. Why take the chance, right?

AdamWiz wrote:Hey All,
I am about to do my first dry hopping, as I have been unimpressed with my beers' aromas thus far. I have an ounce of whole cascade hops that I'm going to use in a "hop sock" on a summer wheat beer about to go into secondary. Just a few questions, probably pretty obvious stuff.
1) As for sanitation, do Is boiling the hop sock in water for a few minuites good to sanitize it?
2) Do I need to do anything to the hops first, or just open, put in the sock, and add to the carboy?
3) Is it true that I only want to add the dry hops when fermentation is totally done? Or do I want it to drop a few points while the hops are in there?
4) 7 days seems to be a common number for dry hopping, any differing opinions?
5) Do I bottle immediately after removing the dry hops, or let it sit a while longer?

any and all dry hop wisdom is appreciated

1) I just thow my hop sack in some star san for a few minutes, then poor the hops in put in ferementor. PS you may want to put some marbles in the sack to weight it down so it does not float.
2) No hops are naturally anti-bug, that is why IPA's were made to make long boat trips without infection.
3) Depends, there are 2 camps on this. I would wait until finished, the thought is that if you do it during active primary is that the CO2 drives off aroma, which is what you are trying to create.\
4) Agree with above 7 - 21 days, I actually did one that I got busy and didn't transfer that sat on dry hops for 3 months and was wonderful with no grassy flavors at all.
5) Agree with above give it a day or 2 to settle out in hop debre then bottle.

I have had the best results with dry hopping in the primary. Wait until about day 6-7 when the fermentation starts to slow quite a bit. No need for the hop sock either. Just add the hops to the primary and give it a good swirl to mix the hops with the beer. Let them sit no longer than 7 days. At this point, if possible, cold crash your primary for 48 hrs in a fridge. This will drop the hops out of suspension and allow you to rack a fairly clear beer over to bottling or keg. Easy as pie.

brewinhard wrote:I have had the best results with dry hopping in the primary. Wait until about day 6-7 when the fermentation starts to slow quite a bit. No need for the hop sock either. Just add the hops to the primary and give it a good swirl to mix the hops with the beer. Let them sit no longer than 7 days. At this point, if possible, cold crash your primary for 48 hrs in a fridge. This will drop the hops out of suspension and allow you to rack a fairly clear beer over to bottling or keg. Easy as pie.

Question: How does cold crashing affect hops in suspension. I know why it works for yeast. With yeast it cause active yeast to go inot a dormant state and thereby fall out of suspension and build up at the bottom. But hops do not have an active state?

After allowing the hops to sit in the beer for 7 days or so, a good 48 hrs of cold crashing will drop the hops to the bottom of the fermenter and allow you to rack a fairly clear beer from above.

brewinhard wrote:After allowing the hops to sit in the beer for 7 days or so, a good 48 hrs of cold crashing will drop the hops to the bottom of the fermenter and allow you to rack a fairly clear beer from above.

That was my question, from my experience cold crashing does nothing to cause hop debree to fail out of suspension and was looking for something scientific that would confirm this?

Personal experience leads me to believe that you will get the same amount to fall out in warm enviroment as cold. From my experience it is more about the beer remaining absolutly stationary for several days. I do cold crash, but, I do it to get yeast to drop out not hops.

The deed is done - I racked to secondary yesterday and added the ounce of dry hops. I weighted the bag down with some of those little decorative glass pebbles(sanitized of course). But apparently I didn't put in enough to weigh the bag down sufficiently. About half of my hops are submerged, but half are still floating on top. Will they eventually soak up enough beer to sink, or do I need to pull out the bag and add more weight?(I am asking because it was A BITCH to get the full hop sock through my carboy's neck and I am not looking forward to trying to pull it out an extra time).

-Adam

BTW - The fresh Cascade hops smelled delicious, very citrusy. I have basically only dealt with pellets, so it was nice to handle some whole fresh hops. They just seem so much more "official" than some little rabbit pellets.