So, why do a full 60 or 90 minute boil if the only bittering addition made is with 10ml of hop extract?
I believe you still need to isomerize the alpha acids in the hop extract to create bitterness. The longer the extract is boiled, the more bitterness is extracted from it just like hops.
Why brew beer at all when you can just go out to the store and buy some? Brewing is as much about the art, science, and process as it is about the product. We are brewers, and yes we can just use extracts and flavorings and such. But the closer you can get to having done it all yourself, the more satisfying it all is.Why do all grain when you can just do extracts? Because there’s something about doing the whole process that feels better. Why barbecue with wood rather than charcoal? Because it makes you feel like you have mastered the ability to control a wood fire.
Isn’t another purpose of the long boil to drive out undesirable compounds, such as DMS?
That’s not my point. I’m all about the art and science. I’m asking about CO2 Hop Extract used as a bittering addition in a full boil–used to offset any vegetal flavors contributed to boiling hops for an hour–and if the extract develops throughout the boil, or if a 20min. boil would produce the same effect.
The post about the isomerization of the acid makes sense to me, otherwise I was thinking that you’d do it to caramelize some of the sugars, but that’s not really what I wanted in my DIPA, which will derive much flavor, aroma, and bitterness from late hop additions.
This is my understanding too, though I have no idea whether you get more isomerization from a 60- or 90-minute boil. As for why you’d use this product, I’ll speak from experience and say it does the job and keeps wort loss due to big bittering charges to a minimum.
I guess some people look down on hop extract but it’s a good product. Unless you’re exclusively using your own homegrown hops, malt, wild yeast, etc, you’re getting help from a pro in some facet or other of the brewing process. Good on you if you actually are doing all that yourself, but personally I feel that I get the best return on my time, money, and effort to use things like extract, pellet hops from Washington, well-modified malts, and lab-grade yeast.
I don’t see using Hop extract as cutting corners at all. That stuff is great. I recently saw a chop and brew episode with John Kimmich who swears by the stuff, (sourced perhaps in NZ from other threads I read) not only because of the precision of the bittering charge, but also for what it doesn’t lend to the beers–namely the vegetal flavors mentioned above. I think the bittering addition is a very important and often overlooked addition. IMO, its not just about getting the right Alpha Acids for a bitterness as an aftertaste, it lends a lot in the way of flavor.
In a Chech pils for instance, you’d boil 2 or 3 ounces of Saaz for 60 or even 90 minutes. And it smells totally different in the kettle, and inevitably tastes different in the finished beer, than if you’d have added .3 ounces of Magnum to get the same IBU.
ANYWAY, I like hop extract for my DIPA. I think it works great.
