Basic question about doing a hop stand. I’ve done several with my generic beer recipe, with great results.
Basic recipe is 5 gallons of wort from 5 lbs light DME, partial mash of 2 pounds o’ mixed grains (about a pound of 2 row, half pound of crystal, half pound of whatever else is kicking around that goes well). Boil 1 oz of Centennial for 60 minutes, cool to 175-180F and hop stand for 60-80 minutes with 2 more oz of Centennial, then cool in a sink of icewater and pitch and ferment.
The only downside to the hop stand is the extra time. It occurred to me that one option might be to take out maybe 2/3 of wort and start chilling it right away. Next, stick the 2 oz of Centennial in the remaining 1/3 of wort and let the smaller volume do the hop stand at 180F for 80 min. Finally, recombine the 180 degree hopstanded portion with the cooled down remainder.
The advantage I see is that you get a big head start on cooling down the wort. If I can get the 2/3 portion down to 40 F or so over the 80 minutes that the remainder is doing the hop stand, then adding the 1/3 @ 180F back into the chilled pot means I should get the whole 5 gallons down to pitching temp a lot sooner.
But will it work? Does the reduced volume of wort taking part in the hop stand cut down on the amount of flavor compounds extracted from the hops? I’d think not – the density of the smaller portion is the same as overall portion, and it would seem like 5/3 gallon of wort is more than enough liquid to work its magic on just 2 oz of hops. But I’m no expert, and I could certainly imagine the hops doing just enough to the water chemistry to hurt the extraction of flavor in a smaller volume.
Does anyone have anecdotal (or scientific) evidence one way or the other?
