100% dry-hopped beers

I may be wrong but neither of those are ciders and neither of those use hops. Gruit = random herbs , sahti = juniper berries. Either way there are probably examples of hopped ciders but A 60 minute boil would caramelize too much of the sugar and you'd have one sweet cider on your hands.

 

well I've never used any herbs or berries for bittering but i would imagine they still have some sort of preservative purpose. so ou're saying you just want to dry hop a sahti?

 

Pretty much all the hop burst and dry hopped beers I know of have at least some (~15%) of the hops added at the beginning of the boil. It helps prevent boil overs, and adds some base bitterness to the beer.

100% dry hopped would be a pretty unique and perishable brew - the hop profile would be very volatile and fade pretty fast - can't think of any commercial beers that are 100%

 

Although you can be successful with only adding hops in the whirlpool (i.e. post-boil, but before cooling and 'knocking out' into the fermenter), you cannot create a beer that has only been hopped with dry hops (i.e. after the wort has been cooled and the yeast is close to hitting Terminal Gravity).

Depending on the whirlpool time, you can extract as much as 35% of your bitterness at this stage.

The best example of this technique that I have experienced was a brew called 'Whirlpool Pale Ale' from La Cumbre Brewing Co. in Albuquerque, NM...no hops were added until whirlpool. It was ~5.3% ABV and it was wonderful.

 

Interesting - so nothing at all for the primary boil? I had been told by some home brew buddies that the oils in the hops help prevent a lot of protein foam and bubbles forming and keep any boil overs in check - do you happen to know how they managed boil overs? Did they have a brew kettle with an agitator or something to keep the wort moving?

 

Correct.

That is also correct.

In short, No...I do not have a direct answer to this inquiry. However, a healthy shot of cold water from a hose is really all you need when managing boil-overs (especially in a commercial brewery). There are also products on the market that assist with the protein break at boil.

 

Cool - good to know! thanks.

 

Can you elaborate on this? Obviously you can physically add hops at this point, so is there something about the combination of no bittering hops + finished fermentation that makes the beer "impossible?"

 

You do not extract ANY bitterness from dry hopping. Therefore, you need heat (i.e. boiling or close-to boiling wort) to extract some bitterness from the hops to counteract the malt sweetness. Otherwise, you will be left with an unbalanced and syrupy mess of a beer.

 

Heat! Heat is the only thing that will isomerize hop oils into the wort to create bitterness. Once the wort is cooled, no bitterness will be imparted since heat is needed to have those oils 'dissolve' into the wort to counteract the bassline sweetness that is the wort (extracted sugar water, separated from the grain).

 

Right, but beers are often dry-hopped in the absence of heat (ie. in secondary, barrels, etc.), right? Sure, it won't add bitterness (which I think is the OP's point) but aren't the compounds responsible for those bright, fresh hop flavors soluble at other temperatures?

 

Those are pretty much my favorite style. I think they still brew with hops though.

 

Maybe let's look at this question a different way:

How many--if any--beer styles exist that don't use something, be it hops, juniper twigs/berries, dandelion, etc for bittering? It sounds like the answer is zero based on the responses in this thread. Even lambics use older hops if I'm not mistaken.

If the answer to that question is zero, then it begs the question: why? Surely there would be a reason why none exist. Similar to why you don't find chicken tartare--because there's something fundamentally wrong with preparing the beer/food in that particular way.

It also would seem to answer the spirit of the OPs question. If there's no style of beer that doesn't use bittering ingredients, then it's not likely that there's any beer that doesn't use bittering ingredients and is dry hopped.

 

I know Tired Hands recently brewed an IPA where none of the hops were added until flameout. I bet that is the closest you will get to finding a 100% dry-hopped beer.

 

No. Hop oils are only extracted above a certain temperature. Once the wort is cooled past a certain point where the yeast can be pitched the hops do not add any bitterness or flavor to the beer.

Also, dry hopping adds no hop flavor to a beer. Flavors are extracted between roughly 25-30 mins left in the boil. Dry hopping is used for aroma, not flavor.