MoreBeer hop rhizome sale – Save 30% on Hop Plants
Limited time and quantity promo code from MoreBeer.com
Promo Codes for the Month of February, 2017
Coupon Code Date: 2-6-2017 to 2-10-2017
Promotion Details: Save up to 30% on Hop Rhizomes
Promo Code: HOP RHIZOME SALE
Coupon Description: Right now More Beer has a sale going on for their hop rhizomes. If you act now, you can save 30% on a variety of hop rhizomes including sterling, columbus, cascade, centennial, chinook and many more! These items also qualify for the MoreBeer free shipping offer!
Dry hopping your beer is one of the easiest ways to make a good beer great and is supper simple to do! At this point I dry hop any Pale Ale or IPA that I brew. It does not make the beer more bitter but instead gives the impression of hoppyness and freshness with fragrant hop aroma. To dry hop your beer, wait until fermenation has completed and CO2 is no longer being generated. The reason for this is so that the escaping CO2 does not carry away the hop aroma with it because you want those odors to stay in contact with the recently fermented beer. I use either whole hops or pellet hops for dry hopping but prefer to use whole hops if available. Depending on the beer I will add between 2oz to 6oz per 5 gallon batch ( I typically go with 2oz, but my Pliny the Elder recipe calls for 5oz). I leave the hops in contact with the fermented beer for approximately 5-7 days and then either transfer to keg or cold crash for another 2 days. The process is that simple and I encourage you to try it on your next hoppy beer batch. When you pour your first pint focus on the aroma and if possible compare it to a batch of homebrew that you did not dry hop to see the difference!
Hops are the cone-shaped flowers of the hop plant humulus lupulus, and they are responsible for the bitter taste and much of the aroma in a beer. The first documented cultivation of hops occurred in 730s AD in the Hallertau region of Germany, but by most accounts they were not widely used in beer brewing until approximately 350 years later. Today there are well over 80 unique varieties of hops that are commonly used to brew beer.
The soft resins and oils used to bitter beer and impart aroma are contained in the lupilin glands of the female hop flower. The hops’ resin is comprised of alpha and beta acids. The alpha acid in hops is the primary source of bitterness and also acts as a preservative in beer. When heated in the brewing process, alpha acids are isomerized and form iso-alpha acids. The amount of time that the alpha acid is subjected to the boil determines the degree of isomerization that occurs, and the amount of bitter flavoring that is produced in the beer.
At a certain point, the boiling begins to have significantly diminished returns on the isomerization of the alpha acid and it becomes ineffective for creating additional bitterness in the beer. Typically that occurs 60 to 90 minutes after adding the hop to the heated wort. The isomerization process occurs when the wort is heated above approximately 175° F. The quantity of alpha acid present in a hop will determine the hop’s bittering potential.
Alpha acid percentages vary dramatically between the different varieties of hops and are impacted by a multitude of outside factors such as storage packaging, age of the hop, storage temperature, oxidization, drying method, and growing conditions. Unlike alpha acid, beta acid imparts only a small portion of the total bitterness in a beer. Yet beta acids are important because, as the alpha acids’ bitterness breaks down over time during fermentation and storage, beta acids create a sharper bitterness as oxidation occurs. Unlike alpha acid, beta acid does not isomerize during the boil and is primarily responsible for the hop aroma in a beer.
Below is a list of commonly expected alpha and beta acid levels for different hop varieties. These are not exact and are just intended for estimation purposes:
Ahtanum Hop, Alpha Acid 5.5-9%, Beta Acid 5-6.5%
Amarillo Hop, Alpha Acid 6-11%, Beta Acid 6-7%
Apollo Hop, Alpha Acid 15-21%, Beta Acid 5-8%
Australian Galaxy Hop, Alpha Acid 12-14%, Beta Acid 5.5%-6.5%
Australian Helga Hop, Alpha Acid 5-6.5%, Beta Acid 4-5%
Australian Pride of Ringwood Hop, Alpha Acid 6-8.5%, Beta Acid 4.5-5.5%
Australian Stella Hop, Alpha 14-16%, Beta Acid 4.5-5.5%
Australian Super Pride Hop, Alpha Acid 13-15%, Beta Acid 6-7%
Australian Sylva Hop, Alpha Acid 4.5-7%, Beta Acid 3-5%
Australian Topaz Hop, Alpha Acid 15-18%, Beta Acid 4-5%
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