I've been posting in home brewing forum for a while, but I have not brewed much. Just a few batches. The regulars here are aware that I've been having problems with my beers. I made an amber recently and it turned out ok. Not great, but it doesn't taste bad. And that is a great improvement for me. My brew is an amber as I said above. It's a little tart, but I think that may be due to that I got some sanitizer in the keg while filling it (about 9.8 fl oz if I am right). Maybe because it fermented a little past the expected FG. Who knows.... I'm chalking this up as a win for me because I finally succeeded at brewing a batch that is ok.
Glad things are getting better man, howd you end up with 10oz of sanitizer in there? Was it straight sanitezer or diluted with h2o? If dilluted, Im not sure youd taste it? I always have a bit of star san foam in my buckets/kegs
It was diluted. The story goes like this: the valve in my autosiphon came loose, and I could not replace it. So I had to start a siphon the old fashioned way. I started a siphon with sanitizer to sanitize the inside, and also to prime it. Clamped the line shut. Placed the racking cane in carboy, hose in keg, undo clamp. Forgot about sanitizer in tube. Should have bled it off in a container. Live and learn. I used volume of a cylinder formula to figure out it was about 9.8 oz
Maybe I should mention the ingredients? 7lbs light extract .5lbs amber extract 1 oz perle 5min into 60 min boil .5 oz nugget 45 min into boil .5 oz nugget at end of boil. Wyeast 1056 smackpack
Could I dry hop it post carbonation? Good idea / bad idea? Suggestions on the hops? I don't think my LHBS has leaf hops, only pellet. I could be wrong though.
I would be concerned that the hops would create nucleation points, causing CO2 to leave solution and foaming, which could be messy. But I haven't tried it.
Since it is keged, I would think the equilibrium pressure in the (somewhat) closed system would keep the CO2 in solution wouldn't it?
Definitely. CO2 would come out when adding hops. But when I seal it up and re-pressuize it again, I would think it would go back into equilibrium again. Maybe worth testing.
I've done it a few times. If you choose to, be prepared to very quickly close and seal the lid after you let go of the bag, I haven't made a mess yet at least but you will see a terrifying maelstrom of carbonation.
Absolutely. I've done this before to conceal flaws. Maybe the beer is under-hopped (multitude of reasons) or has another problem that can be masked with hops. I've done this to IPAs that are past their prime and it does perk them up. My experience; no problem with the carbonation. I've only added to a partially filled keg, so no mess involved. I've used pellets exclusively, either in a nylon paint bag or ss mesh cylinder. Examples are Amarillo, El Doradao, Citra, & Simcoe . . . probably anything will work.
Ya, I was planning on 1 oz of Amarillo, and 0.5 - 1 oz of something.... Citra sounds good too. Thanks for the tip on the nylon paint bags. I'm going to estimate I have 4 gallons left in my keg by using the SWAG method. Think a week should do it? Edit: the place I was going to get the hops does not have Amarillo. Think Cascade would be a good substitute?
A week is probably fine . . . ideally at a temp in the mid 60s although I have left it in the keezer (39). Be sure to "burp" the keg properly after adding/pulling the hops. An even better method when dh'ing is complete is to "jump" the keg to a fresh keg with CO2 (never pop the lid). Also, expect some moderate hop sediment even when using a bag . . . expect your first pour to be green.
Thought I would give some feed back. The dry hopping was a complete success. I dry hopped it with a sanitized mesh paint bag and marbles. I used 2 oz of Amarillo. And I did it cold. Nice, and floral / with nice amount of citrus that was not over powering.
