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My embarrassing brew day

Northern Brewer General
#1

Yesterday I brewed NB’s Surly Bender. Everything was going great. Added the ½ oz Willamette at FWH and ½ oz Columbus at 60 minutes. At 10 minutes added Whirlfloc & yeast nutrient and dropped in the immersion chiller. At flame-out shut off the burner and turned on the garden hose until the wort was down to 70 F. Then I went inside to grab my bucket and strainer when I saw 2.5 oz of Willamette hops sitting on the kitchen table! DOH! That’s 70% of the total hops and they were supposed to go in at flame-out! After uttering a few expletives, I thought about what I should do. Should I take the time to fire up the burner and re-heat and re-cool the wort? What impact would that have on the flavor? Should I just go with what I got and live with a minimally hopped brown ale (it certainly wouldn’t be a Surly Bender)? Maybe because I hadn’t fully recovered from spending the previous day up in a hot attic installing a ceiling fan but, I decided to go what I had and finish up the brew day. Then last night I started thinking that maybe I should have fired up the burner and added the remaining hops after all.

I’m curious what you qualified brewers would have done?

#2

Add them now :grinning:

#3

Yes, do a “bio-transformation-ed” brown ale… Live outside the box… Sneezles61

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#4

Yeah just add them after a week fermentation

#5

What I WOULD have done is add them as a whirlpool/dryhop as soon as I discovered I forgot them. What I would do NOW is add them as a dryhop at high krausen as sneezles was suggesting- in other words at day 2-3 of fermentation. Then maybe get another oz. or 2 to add at day 7 or so.

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#6

I plan to add the forgotten hops this evening. Thanks for the advice!

@jimrmaine, does dry hopping add any bitterness? Is that why you suggest adding 1 or 2 more ounces on day 7?

#7

[quote=“barbarianbrewer, post:6, topic:26301”]
does dry hopping add any bitterness?
[/quote]https://scottjanish.com/dry-hopping-effect-bitterness-ibu-testing/

#8

I will tell you no… Flavor, aroma… yes! And at room temp… See, I is so scientific, ( thanks spell check) I was able to answer without looking! :relieved: Sneezles61

#9

I’m going to add 2 ounces of Cascade tonight. This is day 9 since brew day and about day 12 before bottling day.
When dry-hopping, is it more important to count the days since brew day or from the expected end of fermentation? Does the goal (flavor or aroma) push the timing one way or another? Just curious.

Random FYI: I chose to add cascade hops because I’m drinking a Hopalicious from Ale Asylum (Madison, WI). It has 11 separate additions of cascade hops!

#10

It’s more important to time your dry hop addition before packaging. If you don’t foresee yourself packing for a month there’s no reason to dry hop your beer for 5 days then let it sit for another 25.

I’ve not been pleased with hopalicious the last 3 times I bought it. I think the beer tanked when they moved to their new production facility. It used to be delicious!

#11

Sorry it’s taken me awhile. I didn’t see this until now. The day 2-3 and then again at day7 dryhop schedule is a more typical ‘New England IPA’ technique. I was riffing off of sneezles ‘biotransformation’ comment.

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#12

For an American West coast IPA, I like to wait until fermentation is done… then add hops at room temp… The more the merrier… I’ve still a pound of Cascades waiting… You can add to the keg, and even leave them in… but do allow just even call it 5 days at room temp then start crashing and carbing… And as soon as you can start pouring… Indulge! Sneezles61
I’ve done just at cold crashing and didn’t get the results I had hoped for…

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