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Author Topic: Home grown brew day!  (Read 6203 times)

Offline HobsonDrake

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Re: Home grown brew day!
« Reply #15 on: September 17, 2013, 07:04:10 pm »
Brewing's done. Time for a beer!

3 points short of my target og and 2 pints short of my target volume. Used 5 gallons of hops! All those hops soak up a lot of wort! Hope it's not a no-no to sqeeze 'em!  ;)

I would think that fresh hops would take up less of the wort then dried hops.

I too had a fresh hop brewing this past weekend. Picked them right off and right into the kettle. My regular Pale Ale. 2 oz fresh at 30 and 45 min. add. It is going to be a long wait on this batch to finish.

Just finished up drying all from this year. Don't have a total yet but as was stated up the line, had a bumper crop on the Cascades. I even lost out on half of one plant because I didn't get to it fast enough and they went brown on me.

Next year will be year two for the three new plants. Should be fun.
Check out my brew history and recipes at http://www.hobsondrake.com/BrewList.html

John D.

Offline metron-brewer

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Re: Home grown brew day!
« Reply #16 on: September 23, 2013, 11:46:03 am »
My second year Centennials yielded 5.50 ounces dried and the Hallertau yielded 1.00 ounces dried. Harvested and dried 09-08-2013, brewed 09-21-2013, my first time using whole hops as well as homegrown!

6.75# Pale Ale Malt
5.00$ Maris Otter
.50# C-40
.50 oz HG Centennial at 60
2.00 oz HG Centennial at 15
1.00 oz HG Centennial at 10
1.00 oz HG Centennial at 5
1.00 oz HG Centennial at 0
1.00 oz HG Hallertaua at 0

Beersmith calculated 73.90 IBU and O.G. 1.065. I can’t believe the aroma coming off the fermenter, like fresh picked hops. I cannot wait to see how it tastes.
Ron B.
White Bear Lake, MN

Offline milligan101

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Re: Home grown brew day!
« Reply #17 on: October 03, 2013, 11:28:36 am »
I'm on my second attempt with hops.  15 years ago I planted on the wrong side of the house.  Now theyre in full sun, cascade produces far more than I can brew with (2nd year vines).  Columbus and Willamette are far less productive and may be culled.

Offline TrippleRippleBrewer

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Re: Home grown brew day!
« Reply #18 on: October 10, 2013, 01:47:47 pm »
Harvested my hops the other day, now it's time to get them dancing.
American Brown
8# Washington Select
1.5# crystal 40
1/2# chocolate
2 oz HG Centennial FWH
2 oz HG Cascade at 60
2 oz HG Cascade at 15
1056 at 67°

Seems like too much hops, but I have no idea the alpha content. I'm assuming by smell only that it's about 50% of normal. So I should come in at about 45-50 IBUs

How fun is this?

It's very fun! That recipe looks tasty.
But as you noted, when you add up your time and the investment to grow them, financially it's more silly than trying to justify brewing your own beer to save money. I just do it for fun.

I have first year Columbus, Chinook, Horizon, and Centennial. All three did well with the Chinook and Columbus giving great yields considering their early development. Water regularly is key!

I've followed the same recipe formulation guideline - 50% alpha estimated. I like to use them 20 minutes and later though and I ramp up my recipe by 1.5 gallons and use a lot of them. I use pellets from my LHBS for bittering.

I just brewed Jamil's "West Coast Blaster" at 7.00 gallons and added 3oz of home grown Horizon at flame out. There were other hop additions earlier but my estimate of loss was spot-on and I ended up with 5.5gal in the carboy. The aroma from the Horizon is very mild and rather disappointing however.

I expect different results from the Chinook and Columbus just based on smell when I vacuum bagged them and put them in the freezer. I still plan on bombing the heck out of an IPA with them using massive amounts late and steeping for max effect next brew.

I don't know about others here but I find dry hopping with whole cones a PITA because of both racking difficulties afterwards and getting them in my glass carboy to begin with. I dry hop in the keg instead sometimes.

GYOH!

Offline klickitat jim

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Re: Home grown brew day!
« Reply #19 on: October 10, 2013, 05:30:01 pm »
My homegrown is due to be racked next week. I might bottle it for sharing purposes.

cornershot

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Re: Home grown brew day!
« Reply #20 on: October 11, 2013, 02:59:13 am »
My homegrown is due to be racked next week. I might bottle it for sharing purposes.
Mine is gone. Shared it with some farmer friends to celebrate the harvest and kicked it in one night. Gotta drink it fresh!

Offline pinnah

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Re: Home grown brew day!
« Reply #21 on: November 27, 2013, 07:00:57 am »
Gotta drink it fresh!

So the other night I pull out of the fridge what I thought was a kicked keg of my fresh-n-wet hopped harvest ale.
Still beer in there! Dry hop bag must have plugged my uptake.

I was very surprised how it tasted now that it has had 3 months to age.  Fantastic!  Super smooth, all the rough edges (which I did not mind and attributed to the green hops) were gone. Still excellent bitterness and hop flavor, with the aroma having decreased slightly perhaps.

I might try this intentionally next year.