Just ordered the exeperimental hops over at Yakima Valley. Just wanted to see if my strategy makes sense here…
I’m brewing 5 gallon batches of an IPA - I was going to use the same recipe and toss in the exeperimental hops at 15min. Is that enough time to get good character?
I’ve got a Moasic IPA that could use a buddy hop to elevate it, so i’m trying out these experimental hops.
How does everyone else work with new hops?
I try to read a lot from the hops before use, see how ppl taste and smell after using, this will not get a accuracy parameter, because of the haverst time, store temp and duration, and other things, but if I have a hop that I really want to test there 3 option, for me, use a SMaSH beer with a malt I use a lot, for me is or pilsen malt from the swaen or ale from the swaen too, I did a nelson sauvin SMaSH, but if I want want something not so “boring” I use a recipe that I already did numerous time and this divide in 2 option, the first one replace my hops to the new one, I did a best bitter trying to test green bullet this way, or add the new hop in the recipe and see how they work together, I did a Indian Pale Lager testing loral hops with cascade. The best one to see how the hop behave is the SMaSH one but you can try other ways too
To check out new (to me) hops, I brew a pale ale with a 20 minute hop stand at 180F, with 2 oz of the test hops. Pretty simple, and it gives me a good idea of what the hops are like.
Google Russian Rivers hop2it recipe. That’s what I often do.
I’ve recently adopted using 2 gal small batch BIAB for new grains, hops, and/or yeast or use different water additions. I get a few bottles of beer to try something without having a large resource commitment.
I brew a 1-gallon/15 minute boil, single-hop extract pale ale. It’s quick to do, and you can fit several batches in the time it takes for a typical all-grain brewday if you have a bunch of hops you want to try out. It’s been a few years since I’ve done a batch of these, but a forum search here for “single hopped” should find my old posts with my procedure and tasting notes for various varieties I’ve tried.
Here’s a sample recipe. I shoot for 1.055 OG and 40-45 IBU’s. That’s enough IBU’s to get a picture of how the hop works for bittering without being so much that it overshadows the flavor/aroma. The Munich extract is to boost the maltiness just a bit to get an idea of how the hops interact with malt.
Title: Single Hop Pale Ale
Brew Method: Extract
Style Name: American Pale Ale
Boil Time: 15 min
Batch Size: 0.8 gallons (fermentor volume)
Boil Size: 1 gallons
STATS:
Original Gravity: 1.055
Final Gravity: 1.015
ABV (standard): 5.21%
IBU (tinseth): 40.96
SRM (morey): 4.8
FERMENTABLES:
0.8 lb - Dry Malt Extract - Extra Light (72.7%)
0.3 lb - Liquid Malt Extract - Munich (27.3%)
HOPS:
0.15 oz - Apollo, Type: Pellet, AA: 18, Use: First Wort, IBU: 40.96
0.25 oz - Apollo, Type: Pellet, AA: 18, Use: Boil for 0 min
0.5 oz - Apollo, Type: Pellet, AA: 18, Use: Dry Hop for 7 days
YEAST:
Fermentis / Safale - American Ale Yeast US-05
NOTES:
Add 2-2.5gm of dry yeast.
This is a 1-gallon preboil batch, which gets me roughly 0.8 gallons into the fermenter after a 15-minute boil. The hopping schedule is designed to maximize the amount of hop flavor and aroma. The brewing software I use (Brewer’s Friend) calculates FWH IBU’s as a 20-minute addition, and I feel that this is a decent approximation of IBU’s here.
Also note that for a relatively high AA% hop you can make a batch using a single 1-ounce bag of hops. Low alpha acid hops might take 2 ounces to hit the IBU level you want.