I’ve read somewhere in the forum that you could add extract in the last 15 minutes of the boil and save on hops since your volume and OG would be less.
My question is, would the late extract addition cause a second “hot break”?
Thanks in advance for your help.
Check the John Palmer vids on the NB site he talks about using extracts there a bit.
Mr. Octabird
American Made!
Adding some of the extract late does let you save on bittering hops, but not for the reasons you list. Rather it is because you are mimicking a full-volume boil as far as concentrations go, and hop bittering compounds are extracted more efficiently that way rather than when you are conducting a concentrated boil. But the savings is not very much, about 10 - 15%. Most people consider late extract addition for a different reason: it will reduce darkening of the wort.
The key things you need to remember are that you need to add about half the malt extract at the beginning, as hops don’t work the same when boiled in plain water, and add the other half with about 15 minutes left. Take the kettle off the heat when you add it and stir it in well before putting it back on the heat to prevent the extract from scorching on the bottom.
this is very nice post 
[quote=“rebuiltcellars”]Adding some of the extract late does let you save on bittering hops, but not for the reasons you list. Rather it is because you are mimicking a full-volume boil as far as concentrations go, and hop bittering compounds are extracted more efficiently that way rather than when you are conducting a concentrated boil. But the savings is not very much, about 10 - 15%. Most people consider late extract addition for a different reason: it will reduce darkening of the wort.
The key things you need to remember are that you need to add about half the malt extract at the beginning, as hops don’t work the same when boiled in plain water, and add the other half with about 15 minutes left. Take the kettle off the heat when you add it and stir it in well before putting it back on the heat to prevent the extract from scorching on the bottom.[/quote]
What happens for those of us who do full volume boils and late extract additions?
I suspect that it is very much like brewing a very light beer, you will minimize wort darkening and get very slightly better hop utilization. But you are the one who has done it, so you tell us.
RC is right. When I brewed extract I did full boils. If I was brewing a lighter colored beer I would use late extract additions. Darker beers obviously didn’t matter but I did have positive results with amber/red colored beers that were lighter in color.
I would NOT use late extract additions to try to save hops. Not worth it and I can assure you that the recipe wasn’t designed that way unless it specifically says so.
