IPA freshness

My main concern is oxygen. If I do a really good job with keep everything closed as much as possible and flushing everything with CO2 really well, I tend to get a lot better hop life. I'm really obsessive about oxygen with IPA's/PA's after being cavalier for a long time. I've noticed major difference with them and haven't had one go muddled on me in a long time.

FYI- I even suck up CO2 in my auto-siphon out of the receiving keg with CO2.

 

You should look into closed transfers, pushing the beer with CO2 into a CO2 purged keg through the liquid post, and purge or fill the transfer line with beer first to get that O2 out also.

 

This.

 

My solution is this: Drink faster!

 

I got a bad batch of Citras once...time actually helped it.

In your specific case I would let the yeast floc out a little more before racking and dryhopping...especially if you are only doing 1 addition and then get it into cold storage a little sooner than 2 weeks. As others have said, "purge, purge, purge."

also...did you tie your hop bag up real high by any chance?

 

I brew IPAs a lot; something like 4 batches a year.

My consistent experience with my American style IPAs is:

· Primary and dry hop in primary for a total of 3 weeks.
· Bottle beer after the three weeks but permit the beers to bottle condition for 4-5 weeks before seriously drinking the beer (beer is carbonated after two weeks)
· At the 7-8 week (after brew day) mark the beer is drinking great
· After an additional month (11-12 week mark) I notice the hop aroma starts to fade
· After one more month (15-16 weeks) the hop flavor starts to fade
· If any of the IPAs last one more month (19-20 weeks) the beer is still drinkable but a ghost of its former self.

Yesterday I drank one of my remaining Zythos/Simcoe hopped IPAs. That beer was brewed on 10/25/12 (bottled on 11/16/12). Even though it was at the 10+ week mark the hop aroma was still vivid and the IPA is still very tasty.

I suspect that my IPAs may be lasting a bit longer than the OPs because of bottle conditioning? One aspect of bottle conditioning is that the secondary fermentation consumes some (most?) of the oxygen which get into the bottle.

From a kegging perspective I guess the techniques of CO2 purging (etc.) mimics the effects of bottle conditioning?

Cheers!

P.S. My bottled IPAs are not stored in refrigerator conditions (they are stored at basement temperatures). The conventional wisdom is that cold storage slows hop fade but I personally do not know of any published studies which document this.

 

Jack - you said "Primary and dry hop in primary for a total of 3 weeks" When do you add the hops? My first batch has been in the primary for 8 days now, and the airlock is still bubbling every 10 seconds or so. It's in a bucket, so I can't see how things are progressing. I am not using a secondary fermenter, so i'm not sure when to dry hop in the primary. Anything specific I should be looking for? thanks!

 

A few tricks for minimizing oxygen pick-up. I add the dry hops to the keg, then I flush (twice) then I rack the beer onto the hops, followed by purging the head space (twice). I then chill and carbonate the beer with the hops in there. This is usually the second dose of dry hops, the first go into primary for a few days before kegging (if you still have a bit of yeast activity this helps to reduce the threat of oxidation from this addition). I leave the keg hops in until the beer kicks, never had grassy flavors.

Temperature and oxygen are the two biggest threats to a fresh/hoppy beer. I brewed some solid IPAs before I started kegging, but didn’t brew a great one until I could force carbonate, keg hop, CO2 flush etc.

 

"It wasn't so high that the hops were not submerged"

Maybe initially, but as you drain the keg, they will uncover.
I tie mine just high enough to keep them off the bottom and never have to weigh them down.

 

"airlock is still bubbling every 10 seconds or so"
Likely just CO2 coming out of solution @ 8 days.

 

How is this for irony? I just posted on when it is OK to dry hop an IPA in another thread (link provided below).

My personal homebrewing experience with my IPAs (OG about 1.064 and using US-05) is that my signs of fermentation (bubbling) completes in 7-10 days.

I postulated in the other thread that you would not lose a lot of the dry hops aroma potential if the bubbling rate is slow (6 seconds or your case of 10 seconds) but I must admit that I really don’t have a quantifiable answer here. I doubt that you would lose much since your fermentation is winding down (some folks think it is a good idea to add dry hops with some fermentation remaining).

So, if you a patient wait a few more days for the bubbling to complete but I really think it would turn out OK if you dry hopped now.

Cheers!

http://beeradvocate.com/community/threads/how-long-will-my-ipa-ferment.59937/#post-809256

 

My understanding is that there are two sides to the when to dry-hop argument. One side (inc. Firestone Walker) advocates dry hopping when fermentation is still slowly churning. They claim that the yeast will uptake any oxygen produced and that the agitation of the wort will help speed extraction. The other side (inc. Russian River) believes it is more important to get the beer as bright as possible before dry hopping as any remaining yeast in solution will strip hop character from the beer as it flocculates.

What does this really tell me? That you can add hops at either (or both) of these times and make a wonderfully aromatic IPA if these two breweries add their dry hops at different times.

 

great answers. Good timing on my part, too... Thanks guys!

 

Some also say the yeast activity will modify the hops compounds in a desirable way. There are those that say do both.

Matt and Vinnie know more than a little about hops, so they might be working to their taste, equipment, and house yeast strain.

 

Theres also the whole yeast transformation of hop compounds argument you get from those that dry hop before primary is finished (Glycosides, other biotransformations of oils, etc.).

Personal experience and preference is doing both, a dose of dry hops at the tail of primary, before the yeast drops with a little bit of sugar left, then a second keg hopping after cold crashing or fining (occasionally, if triple dry hopping, a second in the fermenter after clearing and removal of the first round of dry hops).

The one thing I can't seem to have good results with is the very short dry hop residence times that Kern and Firestone use (e.g. 2-3 days), I just can't seem to get shit for extraction with it... you have any experiences with cutting your residence time and its effects?

EDIT. I see hopfenunmaltz posted something similar the same time I was writing.

 

My guess is that pellets and agitation would be two things to consider. Many breweries use pumps to circulate their beer, but on a homebrewing scale this might be an easier option: http://www.rebelbrewer.com/shoppingcart/products/Stirhog-BLACK-MAXX-Stir-Plate.html

 

I was plagued with oxidation issues for years without knowing it. Beers that were over the top hoppy at bottling time (bottled from the keg) in both flavor and aroma would be dismissed by judges as having virtually none of either a mere three weeks later. Control bottles that I saved for reference confirmed their notes. Beer left in the keg usually deteriorated in much the same way, but at a slower pace. There was virtually no wet cardboard evident, so I never thought to blame it on oxidation. Instead, I became obsessed with sanitation (probably not a bad thing, just a red herring). Gordon Strong did an article on flaws in a recent issue of either BYO or Zymurgy (I don't recall which). The segment on oxidation was like deja vu. He described my issues with uncanny accuracy. I've developed a whole new obsession with keeping the O2 out, starting with a Blichmann Beer Gun. I've also cobbled together the hardware necessary to move the beer between vessels anerobically. Preliminary results are encouraging.

 

Wouldn't something like that cause the beer to pick up oxygen? I realize the airlock shouldn't allow any oxygen in but I still think I'd be afraid to use it.