Yakima Valley* has some of the lowest prices I've seen for Amarillo, Cascade, Centennial, Mosaic, Simcoe . . . plus you can get 8 or 16 oz packets. For IPA-brewers this is your call to arms. My larder is full. *not affiliated
Will have to check them out,I can see buying a little larger volumes,just as long as your brewing regularly so your Yeast doesn't die in the pkg,Larry http://www.yakimavalleyhops.com/
Hops sit nice in the freezer for a year or two. Coincidentally, that's about the shelf life for dry yeast packs.
I buy most of my hops in bulk (have a couple varieties I really like) and my yeast (use liquid) as I need them (use different strains depending on what I'm brewing).
Thanks. I should figure out what brews I plan to do this summer and get some orders in. The weather is still cold enough that I wouldn't be too concerned about shipping temperatures.
Consider that, unless you're using southern hemisphere varieties, there's only one harvest per year. It makes sense, then, to buy a year's supply once a year, right after the harvest. You can save a butt load of money and, as long as you store them properly, you're not sacrificing freshness.
Except that prices often go down months after the harvest and that most hop purveyors store their hops at least as well as most homebrewers.
Huh? ...I would still buy by the lb most of the time...just not necessarily as soon as the harvest is in.
You're right, but it's a rare year that I use more than a lb of a single variety of hops, so there's no good way for me to exploit that. I want the hops as fresh as possible, so I tend to buy them as soon as they're released. If I wait three months, for example, I'm using last year's crop during those three months. Obviously, YMMV.
I'm a sucker for whole cone Simcoe for my HopRocket and Citra, Mosaic, Amarillo, and El Dorado in any form as long as my freezer has room and the price is right .
The storage facilities I have been in while at YCH were at about 30F. That is above most home freezer temps, 0F or below.
