Hops - Growing



Cascade plant



Nugget Hop tower

After making your own beer, whats the next level? How about growing your own ingredients?  While it isn't practical for the homeowner to grow fields of barley, hops are actually not so difficult.  There are numerous websites selling hop rhizomes (Root cuttings you can use to propagate the plant)

I forget if these plants are on their second or third year, but I do know I only got hops from one of them (Nugget) last year.  It was enough to make a nice IPA and I plan to do the same this year - but hopefully with enough hops left over to dry and save for later batches too.

I moved the Cascade plant to a better spot with more sunlight and it has thanked my with tons of hop cones.  I have it growing horizontally along the fence.

For the nugget plant, I made a 20' pole and hung strings for it to climb.  In only a few months, it climbed to the top and back down another 6'.  It looks like this single massive hop tower.

In a few weeks, I will harvest and use a ton of them in a nice IPA.  Most recipes use dry hops, which weigh about 80% less than fresh, so I will need to adjust by about 5x, so while a normal IPA recipe may ask for 1/2# or so of hops, I will need more like 4 pounds...

I will post more on that IPA when the time comes.

Drying hops - Assuming I have enough to save for future batches, I will need to dry them for proper storage.  There are a number of methods suggested out there.  I am leaning towards filling a pillow case and putting it in the dryer.  Once they lose 70-80% of their weight I will pack them in ziplock bags and store in the freezer.

Other uses - I also like to make Hops tea from the fresh hop flowers.  For this, just break up a few cones, put them in a tea steeper, fill a container with hot tap water and put in the fridge.  Once it cools down you have a nice refreshing hoppy beverage.  Now that I have a carbonator cap, I may try some hops soda...mmm.  My wife has a recipe for ginger hop soda that we want to try.



Lambic 2012 (Peach) blending

2/3 of my 2012 Lambic blends now completed and aging.
I did the raspberry last week and will do the gueuze sometime in a few months probably.
For this beer, I also took 1 gallon from each of the 2011 and 2012 base beers. We went peach picking on Saturday and picked 9pounds of yellow peaches. The white were not ready yet. Since only a few were ripe, I added 2.5 pounds on Saturday and another 1.5 Monday night for a total of 4 pounds in 2 gallons. This should be enough to get a nice peachy aroma and flavor.
Sometime next year we will get to see how well that goes...

Raspberry Wheat - Tasting

This beer (Recipe) (Brewing) has only been in the keg for about a week and its just about ready for drinking now.  Just in time for tomorrow's party.
 Low malt flavor, just enough hops to balance and a neutral yeast make this wheat beer a clean canvas for the local raspberries to shine.

Appearance:  It has this reddish amber or maybe copper color.  Not as bright red as I would have liked, but this is what you get without food coloring.  The head is nice foamy slightly pink, but mostly white.

Aroma:  the smell is mostly fruity (I would guess raspberry) with a little wheat in the background.

Flavor:  It has a slight tartness and up front berry flavor with a little wheat.  I think there are some hops sneaking in too.

Mouthfeel:  Thin, but in a nice refreshing way.  The carbonation gives it some body.  Just about what I would want for a light refreshing fruity summer beer.

Overall: I do like the beer and I hope it is taken well tomorrow - but I do hope they leave me some to savor over the next month or so too.  Also it gives a preview to what the lambic version may be when it is ready.

 7/8/12 - Brew 5.25 gals.  BR=12 OG=1.046
   Wort was surprisingly clear/white
   US-05 pitched @71 - In swamp cooler w/ ice bottles.
  7/13-15/12 - Picked 7.5# raspberries (total)
  7/15/12 - Added 5.5# Raspberries to Primary  G=1.005
  7/26/12 - Secondary G=1.006
   Not a whole lot of raspberry aroma.  Some flavor. OK warm.  should be better cold/carb
   Good clarity.  better than expected.  color good, little lighter.
  8/2/12 - Keg  ABV=5.25%

Raspberry wheat 2012

Last year, I made a "wheat" beer with wild raspberries to serve at my daughter's birthday party. I add the " because at the last minute, I couldn't get any wheat malt and substituted a couple pounds of wheat flour. The beer turned out good, so this year I am only changing things a little. The recipe now has 50% wheat malt and I chose a different hop.

I brewed the base beer on 7/8/12. The brew day was rather uneventful and went pretty smoothly. I was surprised at how clearish white the wort was coming out of the mash tun. I am not used to brewing without darker malts. The whole thing looked greenish while boiling with the hops. It carmelized in the kettle a bit, so the final wort looked like the more usual light brown.

Friday 7/13 picked around 2# but almost half were eaten, leaving me with 1.25#
Saturday 7/14 picked over 4#. After washing, I had 5.5# of berries.
2# are going to the lambic, which leaves 3.5 for this.
Sunday I picked another 2# giving me a total of 5.5# for this beer.

I will give it another week or so before racking to secondary to let it clear up before kegging.  This will be on tap for mid-August.

My little helper

Lambic 2012 (raspberry) - blending

Raspberry Lambic - Framboise
Fruit beer aged for years with various microbes with fruit added (in this case raspberries)

After my first Lambic attempt 2 years ago with the Dawson creek kit from northern brewer turned out pretty good, I decided to start my own lambic project.

Spring of 2011, I brewed 5 gallons of wort and pitched wyeast lambic blend - this part has been aging quietly since.

Spring of 2012, I stepped it up and brewed almost 10 gallons. This time I pitched a combination of lambic blend, slurry from the year before and some bottle dregs from sour beers I have been sampling.

The plan is to take 3 gallons from both years, blend them and split to 3 separate 2 gallon batches. One gets raspberries, one gets peaches and the last will be gueuze.

I know 1.5 years in is a little early to start blending them, but I am impatient, this will age another 6 months before bottling and I am saving plenty for next year.

This weekend (7/13-7/15) is peak season for wild raspberries here in Croton. Over the weekend, I picked over 7.5 pounds (Not including the 1-2 we ate). 2 pounds of this is for this lambic, the rest goes into RaspBerry Wheat.


Framboise in BB



I had a little tasting session Friday night to see how the 3 batches were doing and confirm my 50/50 blend plan. All went well and I am sticking to the plan. There was some tartness, a little brett flavors coming through and luckily no horrible off flavors. The older one had some apple flavor and the younger one had a little too much oak tannin.

The 2011 batch was crystal clear, while the 2012 was almost opaque it was so cloudy. Hopefully that will settle out with extended aging. The 2012 that I had in this plastic cubitainer tasted like it was more aged than the half in glass, so I will go with that one.



Lambic 2011 original gravity: 1.055 SG now: 1.003

Lambic 2012 original gravity: 1.050 SG now: 1.008

Expected abv: 6%



 

 

Zythos Pale Ale

With the success of my Zythos IPA, I decided to use most of the remaining hops for a lighter pale ale version to serve on July 4th.

I based the recipe off of the IPA, lowered the alcohol a bit, adjusted bittering hops to match and changed a few things based on what I had on hand.

This was kegged and ready just in time for our July 4th BBQ. I was hoping it would have cleared up more by then, but it still had chill haze. Good thing we served in red plastic cups :)

Brewing:
Recipe here

The brew day was reletively uneventful.  Gravity was a hair under what I wanted, but still OK.  I used 4 ounces of Zythos hops in the boil, and one each dry hop and keg hop.  Original Gravity: 1.045, Final Gravity: 1.005.  ABV: 5%

Tasting:
It has finally cleared up and looks great, though I might like it a little lighter.
A nice hoppy aroma with citrus fruitiness. The flavor is similar with a nice balance. Definitely not too sweet or bitter, which makes it nice and drinkable. The light body helps here too. The carbonation is a little high, which is the only thing keeping me from from chugging it.

Overall:
I do like this beer, but am not sure if I will brew again. In the lighter beers, people seem to preffer more malt/less hops.  I will focus my hoppy efforts on the stronger IPAs.

Zythos IPA - Tasting

I love the way this beer turned out. My goal was strong citrus American hop flavor without too much bitterness. I did originally plan it to have higher alcohol, but it is ok where it ended up. I do not expect this keg to lay too long, which is ok because these IPAs are best fresh. This weekend, I will be brewing a lighter pale ale version of this.
Links: Recipe Brewing

The beer is this pretty copper color with great clarity. I think I will stick with using a secondary. It helps to drop the yeast out before I get it into the keg.

The aroma is all hops. American citrus type hops.

For the most part, the flavor matches the aroma, hoppy goodness. There is a little malty sweetness to help balance.

The beer is quite drinkable, especially for a 7.5%abv beer. It has this thirst quenching quality to it. I could drink it by the quart.

Notes:
  4/7/12 - Brewed - OG=1.061 (Poor efficiency)
  4/22/12 - Secondary G=1.005   + 1 oz Zythos dry-hop
      Hazy, but not too yeasty.  Some hop aroma, good hoppy flavor.
  5/10/12 - Keg Zythos IPA  FG=1.004  ABV=7.5%
      + 1oz Zythos keg-hop
  Initial tasting - Soft with pleasant hop flavor with a hint of "Soapy"   Low bitterness
  So far, I have not had any issues with the keg hops. I didn't do anything special, just tied up 1oz of pellet hops in a mesh Baggie and threw them in.

And a thank you to Keith for the perfect mug to drink this beer from!