Im curious what success you guys may have had aging pellet hops. I was thinking about picking up some hops to age but thought it might be more convenient to keep pellets rather than whole cone. I figured I would just break them up real well, put them in a paper bag and stick them in the attic for a while. How long have you aged your hops, what type were they, what form and where? Also, how much can you tell the difference between Saaz to EKG to Warrior or Apollo? Does it all just mesh together once they get oxidized? Thanks for sharing you experience!
If you are looking to age hops for a Lambic in the future, I believe you are going to want a hop variety with a close AA% to BA% ratio, and still in the lower AA% range. Over time the AA degrade, but the Beta become oxidized as well and they play a higher role in adding any bitterness to the end product as well as the anti-microbial properties. I would avoid something with a fairly high BA% as this might give too much bitterness in the final beer than one with a lower BA%, which is why the lower AA% hops usually work well. Other than that, once fully aged, they shouldn't have any defining characters, but I haven't ever heard of any tests to give definitive answers to that question.
Thanks. Im not totally sure I will use them on a lambic style beer yet, something sour for sure though. I had Trinity's 7 Day sour recently and that gave off some Gueuze like smells for me so I thought that might be rather interesting to play with.
Unless you are doing a true spontaneous sour, I don't think aged hops are worth the effort. Just keep the IBUs low and you'll be fine. Very little character in a sour beer is coming from compounds added by the aged hops, although there is some interesting research on the compounds generated by aging hops.
I keyed off on something Chad Yakboson said said about Brett playing with the Poly Phenols from aged hops. That is mostly what peaked my interest in aged hops, I have been perplexed by that very specific Gueuze smell and flavor I dont see when re pitching the dregs. I always describe it as a burnt rubber sensation but that may be just how I am interpreting it.
I've aged hops almost by accident, as they've just gotten old and I didn't want to add any cheesy flavor to a new beer. I then used my "collection" which was completely mixed (but all of basic/noble hops) for a sour beer with cherry added and that worked fine. The weird part is that unless you're going to seriously experiment with it, you're really kind of flying blind. There's no way to work out the actual IBU's that you'll get, but at the same time I think you've also got a lot more flexibility as they're not nearly as potent. Overall, given the price of hops (unless you've got a source for cheap old hops), I'd have to agree with OldSock on this one.
Here is something I have been wondering, and hoping you might have info on it. When I drink sour beers made in the States (normal hops, low IBU, commercial pitch, non-spontaneous) I get a fairly clean sour (unless they have acetic issues) with no real bitterness, Flander's Reds too. When I drink a Cantillon or 3F or even a Boon, I get this harsh bitter/sour blend. Not really sure how to describe it, but it's like another acid (non-acetic, non-lactic) and a harsher bitterness combined. I am not sure if this is from the hops, possibly poly-phenol derived or oxidized beta acids, or if it an organic acid from the early bacteria before the Lacto drops the initial pH? I get it in my over-night chilled Lambic that was left for a week before seeing signs of fermentation, but not on my blackberry and peach cultured yeast Lambic or my clean primary with soured secondary Blondes. The only other difference between my process on these beers (ambient inoculation vs pitched yeast & microbes) is that the over night had aged hops while the others have standard hops with low-IBUs. Thoughts? As a side note, be very careful waddling into the garage carrying a large pot of hot liquid between your legs fresh off the flames or even cooled just below boiling, it can burn your legs up pretty bad when you hit the sides of the kettle. If I ambient chill again I will be brewing in the garage instead of in the driveway and leaving the whole thing on the burner to chill.
Ha, by that description your legs should be the least of your worries... Your mention of other bacteria working on the wort before the lacto drops the pH has merit that would explain what I was talking about with re pitching dregs.
Likely a combination of things: character from the aged hops, character from the turbid mash, character from the oxidative yeast and entric bacteria, character from long aging in old barrels, character from autolysis etc. That's the fun thing about these beers, there aren't simple answers to why they taste a certain way.
I'm going to make an assumption that turbid mash, and aging in barrels are probably not effecting the particular character I am describing. I assume that since I did a single infusion mash, and have it in a carboy. The flavor presented itself early enough (2+ months) that I would think that autolysis might not be part of that mix either, but I did end up adding some of the 1 year old slurry from my first batch, so there was a mass of dead yeast in there.
I asked them about these hops and this is the response I got back. "We have stored these as leaf hops in the freezer for about 5 years. Tested them with no alpha and then made them into pellets and tested again with no alpha. We did not have these originally tested as they were intended for Choice Debittered."
