First time dry hop in the keg...not good

Northern Brewer General
1

Kegged an IPA yesterday. The hydrometer sample tasted really good (for warm, flat beer).
I added about an ounce of whole leaf simcoe to the keg, put it in the fridge and force carbed at 40 psi for 24 hours.

Tasted it tonight to check the carbonation level and I’m getting a super strong grassy aroma and taste.

I was really surprised to get that flavor since the hops have only been in the beer for a day.

There are lots of variables here:

  1. I drank a bit too much of my previous IPA on brew day - but if I F’d anything up too bad, I would have tasted something bad in the hydrometer sample yesterday.
  2. The ounce of simcoe I added was actually mostly simcoe (a gift from my LBHS that was a leftover from Dog Fish Head) and a little bit of homegrown cascade - I haven’t mixed them before but I’ve used both as dry hops in previous brews that were good.
  3. My palate is a bit suspect, so what I describe as “grassy”, might be something else, but whatever the flavor, it’s weird.

Did I do something wrong? Should dry hops be added to the keg after it’s been carbed?

Good news is that this was only half of a 10 gallon batch. Second carboy is getting an ounce of cascade in the normal dry hop manor, so I kind of have a control batch.

Let me know what you think.
Thanks!

2

I suggest waiting a week, then re-tasting. 1 oz of IPA dry hops in keg is very conservative, in my experience.

Also, I know people that say it’s better to dry hop at warm temp’s, but I usually dry hop in keg as I’m carbing it up, at refrigerator temps, and it works fine but probably just takes longer to impart the aroma.

After one week of carbonation and cold conditioning, your beer will taste so much better (especially after you draw off the first couple pints of yeast and hop sediment).

3

[quote=“beermebeavis”]I suggest waiting a week, then re-tasting. 1 oz of IPA dry hops in keg is very conservative, in my experience.

Also, I know people that say it’s better to dry hop at warm temp’s, but I usually dry hop in keg as I’m carbing it up, at refrigerator temps, and it works fine but probably just takes longer to impart the aroma.

After one week of carbonation and cold conditioning, your beer will taste so much better (especially after you draw off the first couple pints of yeast and hop sediment).[/quote]

+1 give it some time

i heard this recently on this forum, and I like how it sounds - “when in doubt wait it out”

4

I’d suspect the homegrown hops, a lot of people pick them too early and they are grassy. Have you used them for dry-hopping before?

I find dry hopped beers are slightly grassy a lot of times. Its just part of the deal with adding plant material.

I don’t think you’d want to carb then add hops, it’d cause a lot of foaming and just opening the keg would be a foamy pain. You did it right.

5

My dry hops are always grassy at first. The warmer you keep the keg the quicker this goes away. Once the grass is gone you will love it.

6

Thanks guys. I’ll wait it out and see what happens.

Tom - I’ve used the homegrown hops multiple times with good results. I know what you mean, though, about picking them too early. I harvested the hops three times last year. I ended up throwing the hops from the second harvest away because I picked them too early and they didn’t smell hoppy at all. They just smelled like a bag of leaves.

7

at 40 degrees it might take up to 2 weeks for the grassiness to go away. Although with only 1 oz it shouldn’t take too long. I think what you’re actually tasting is the plant material from the hops. At some point it settles out and you are left with delicious oils.

8

I’ve sampled the beer every day since my initial post on Sunday, and the flavor change has been amazing. On Sunday, I could hardly finish the sample (I pushed through it, though). The next day, the grassy flavor was much reduced, but still there. Today, I could hardly detect it!

Thanks. I almost pulled the hops out before posting here.