Dryhop in the bottle w/ hop pellets?

framptonbmx · November 19, 2011, 2:37pm

Hey guys,

I just got back to my brewing after a long hiatus and I was wondering if this seems feasible? I usually keg my beer and dryhop in the keg, but I was planning to bottle my new IPA. I was planning to dryhop for a while in the primary fermenter, but I really love that powerful hop aroma, so I was wondering, is it possible to add one or two hop pellets to each bottle to dryhop in the bottle? I would use a pair of sanitized tweezers and I’m assuming the green junk would settle out once the beers were in the fridge for a while. Has anyone ever tried this? Is it a good idea or bad?

pinnah · November 19, 2011, 3:15pm

I would be in the bad idea camp. Seems I remember hearing that they do not settle out and you basically get green teeth drinking.

But, not to say you shouldn’t give it a try, especially because you could try it in a portion of your bottling batch.

:cheers:

the_professor · November 19, 2011, 4:06pm

I’m with pinnah…go ahead and try it as an experiment, in just a few bottles. You may get the enhanced aroma you’re after, but i think that you can probably expect a lot of ‘floaties’ in the beer when you pour it.

Seems to me that even if the hop particles did eventually settle out, just the act of opening the bottle might kick up enough turbulence to rouse some of the particles. After all, they don’t flocculate the way yeasts would.

I guess you could pour it through a tea strainer into your glass, though. :mrgreen:

denny · November 19, 2011, 4:56pm

Based on my own experience, I’d say REALLY bad idea.

framptonbmx · November 23, 2011, 9:57pm

Cool guys. Thanks for all the responses. The Denny has spoken. No in bottle dry hopping. What is a reasonable time to dry hop in the fermenter? Is it somewhere between 7 and 14 days? It’s been so long, I can’t remember.

brandon · November 23, 2011, 11:05pm

Our club’s competition has a part called the Hopgod Challenge…Obviously for hoppy as hell beers.
I’ve seen and tasted an entry that had a couple of dried whole hops wrapped in cheese cloth tied with fishing line inside the bottle. Not sure how much that really helped but it sure was a big hoppy aroma.

shorttom007 · November 23, 2011, 11:40pm

I was about to say, perhaps you could just add one or two whole leaf hops into the bottle. Still don’t know how that would do or how much effect it would have, but it could be worth a try. Can’t think it would be WORSE than pellets.

brandon · November 24, 2011, 12:11am

I didn’t get to taste this other one…but someone primed their bottled hoppy beers with that new hop candy

deadeye1 · November 24, 2011, 4:11pm

I’ve tried this before. I bottled a batch of beer and at the end of the secondary there was alot of hops from dry hopping. I decided to bottle up four bottles. I named them ME SO HOPPY. I aged them for about a year. I compared them side to side with the clean beers. I bareley noticed a difference. Exept for the hops in the teeth. A worthy experiment none the less.