I’m sure Im going to get both answers to this but with what Im seeing and hearing, with todays “quality” yeasts there is no need for a secondary fermenter unless Im adding some thing to the beer,…ie hops, fruit, oak. What does the majority have to say about this
Absolutely! All you’d be doing is unnecessarily exposing your beer to oxygen and the possibility of contamination.
One fermenter is all you need. I have not used a secondary in 10+ years.
I transfer to a keg directly from the primary fermenter, cold crash it under CO2 pressure, and allow it to condition/lager/carbonate/mature/whatever until I need it. If I want to add dry hops I do it in the primary fermenter during active fermentation so the yeast will consume any O2 I inadvertently add when I open the lid.
I agree with that.
Thanks for the replies and will be using one fermenter for sure. My question now is how many of you brewers dry hop during “active” fermentation suggest by Brewbama. Most of the recipes I have been using say to dry hop closer to the end of fermentation. What are your thoughts on that?
I do not. I dry hop post fermentation. While dry hopping during fermentation may help with O2 exposure, I don’t care for the flavor effects I get from doing it that way. I cold crash to 35F for a few days, then dry hop for 48 hours at 35F. I have dry hopped hundreds of batches and I prefer the results doing it that way to anything else I’ve tried.
I DH just after high krausen. In my attempt to brew the perfect hazy IPA, my first several batches were dry hopped very late, close to bottling. I experienced oxidation issues on more than half. After several more batches I’ve perfected (for my process) a hop schedule of 5 minutes, hop stand and DH after high krausen, which seemed to have remedied the oxidation issue and has also perfected the bitterness/hoppiness balance for my taste.
That’s what I do I like the cold dry hop. I cold crash and add the hops to the fermenter for 2-3 days and the flavor is better in my opinion.