I have some homegrown Nugget and Cascade hops. I’m thinking of making a Sierra Nevada like pale ale with them. How do you think subbing the Nugget in for Magnum bittering hops would affect the beer? I don’t have enough hops to make an IPA. Just trying to come up with a way to use my own hops together.
It’s tough to use homegrown hops for bittering without knowing their alpha acid %. Most brewers use their homegrown hops for late boil and whirlpool additions.
+1, that said, Nugget itself is a fine bittering hop and would work fine to bitter a pale ale, assuming you could accurately get the appropriate bitterness from your brew.
Try using the average AA for nugget, and use that to figure the addition to hit your IBU target.
Next time, increase or decrease as your taste says you need to.
I was going to use the lower end of the AA range for the hops. My LHBS suggested to up quantity 20% for home grown, so i assumed my CT grown hops would come in on the low end. Bad assumption?
I’m planning on a 3 gal test batch.
You’ll get a different type of bitterness from the Nugget than the Magnum
I see Nugget describe as having “heavy herbal” and “mild pleasant herbal” taste on different hop growers sites. So, that’s why i’m here asking. Don’t want to brew something terrible. Different but drinkable is OK.
Nugget is a fine cheap hop for bittering. Not as smooth as Magnum or Warrior, but more smooth than CTZ.
Yep, that’s what I was getting at. The quality of bitterness won’t be as smooth as with Magnum.
I use Magnum for my smooth styles. I use Nugget for my IPA. I like them both a lot, but Nugget carries a club. Magnum carries a pillow.
I’ve actually heard the opinion that homegrown hops can carry more alpha acids than commercial hops, since they’re often picked with more care and therefore lose less of the lupulin glands. Of course, it all comes down to how you cared for them during the growing season and how you dried and packaged them, etc. I only use homegrowns for bittering in beers where I’m not super concerned about hitting the numbers dead on.
I’ve been bittering with Nugget for a lot of recent batches, and I wouldn’t say it’s rough. But Magnum is definitely way smoother. Almost too smooth for my tastes.
Same here for Magnum. I use Columbus and Chinook primarily for bittering hoppy styles, but I use Nugget occasionally, too.
Having witnessed commercial hop harvest, I don’t think that’s a valid concern.
I agree - the big hop growers have it down pat, and most homegrowers are kind of limited in terms of equipment. I think my homegrown hops tend to get too dry before packaging, and the cones sometimes shatter and leave lots of sticky lupulin behind.
I use my homegrown hops a LOT for bittering. Like almost every batch. You can learn through trial and error what your alpha acid is. It varies a little from year to year but usually is pretty close depending on your weather and consistency of harvest time.
I can’t say I have used Nugget for bittering yet, but if memory serves, I thought it was a low cohumulone hop, so it should be just fine for bittering. Like hopfenundmalz said earlier, use the average (13%) your first time with them and then adjust from there if you’re a little off. It probably will be almost perfect on the first try, assuming you didn’t harvest way too early or something like that.
My homegrown Cascades have averaged 6.1% since 2009, with a range from about 5.9 to 6.2%. It hasn’t varied a lot. These values are approximate, based on how my beers taste vs. expectations. YMMV.
Magnum is great, but for heavensakes, there’s other bittering hops out there. Expand your horizons. Maybe even try some homegrowns!
Or “worst” case, if you have enough hops and are willing and able to spend $30-$45, you can send off an ounce of hops for testing (I know the first post here didn’t have enough for that, but it sounds like others did). My thought is that if you’re going to brew a lot of batches, the extra knowledge and extra precision are helpful. I’ve done this on two occasions, once when my dad sent out a pound of homegrown Cascade hops, and another time when a friend sent a pound of “wild”/“feral” hops from his property in Washington.
On the other hand, it is kinda fun to experiment and work out one’s own flavor perceptions!