Home grown hops 2022

If you have a hop related question about International Bittering Units or alpha acid, post it here!
clarets7
Piss Artist
Posts: 231
Joined: Sun Sep 16, 2018 8:56 am
Location: Hebden Bridge, West Yorkshire

Re: Home grown hops 2022

Post by clarets7 » Fri Aug 19, 2022 4:49 pm

Meatymc wrote:
Fri Aug 19, 2022 4:39 pm
clarets7 wrote:
Thu Aug 18, 2022 10:40 pm
Meatymc wrote:
Thu Aug 18, 2022 9:11 pm
Where are you in the County by the way?
Just outside Hebden Bridge, about 600 feet up and south facing.
I'm a Heptonstall lad myself!
My view from the front door is the two churches at Heptonstall!
"The paradise of the rich is made out of the hell of the poor" - Victor Hugo

User avatar
Meatymc
Drunk as a Skunk
Posts: 836
Joined: Mon Sep 01, 2014 8:36 pm
Location: Northallerton, North Yorkshire

Re: Home grown hops 2022

Post by Meatymc » Fri Aug 19, 2022 4:52 pm

clarets7 wrote:
Fri Aug 19, 2022 4:49 pm
My view from the front door is the two churches at Heptonstall!
As good a view as anywhere in the country in my opinion!!!

Pity you have to contend with the A646 assuming they're still buggering around with it in 'royd - best mate still lives up Stubbs.

clarets7
Piss Artist
Posts: 231
Joined: Sun Sep 16, 2018 8:56 am
Location: Hebden Bridge, West Yorkshire

Re: Home grown hops 2022

Post by clarets7 » Fri Aug 19, 2022 10:14 pm

Meatymc wrote:
Fri Aug 19, 2022 4:52 pm

Pity you have to contend with the A646 assuming they're still buggering around with it in 'royd - best mate still lives up Stubbs.
Luckily I don't have to face that too often now I'm retired! Bit like the Forth rail bridge, always something being done to it. Did you used to drink in the Fox and Goose by any chance?
"The paradise of the rich is made out of the hell of the poor" - Victor Hugo

User avatar
Meatymc
Drunk as a Skunk
Posts: 836
Joined: Mon Sep 01, 2014 8:36 pm
Location: Northallerton, North Yorkshire

Re: Home grown hops 2022

Post by Meatymc » Mon Aug 22, 2022 2:11 pm

clarets7 wrote:
Fri Aug 19, 2022 10:14 pm
Did you used to drink in the Fox and Goose by any chance?
Only occasionally to be honest. Cross and White Lion in the village the regular haunts. Albert and Nutclough on a Thursday - Goose Eye (when still in Goose Eye) if someone fancied a drive out - Hare and Hounds if we fancied a walk.

And of course in formative years, Shoulder & Mutton at Blackshaw with New Delight en route. Work days were the Plummet Line and Lewins in Halifax.

No idea how many have survived over the intervening 40 years!

clarets7
Piss Artist
Posts: 231
Joined: Sun Sep 16, 2018 8:56 am
Location: Hebden Bridge, West Yorkshire

Re: Home grown hops 2022

Post by clarets7 » Mon Aug 22, 2022 2:52 pm

Shoulder at Blackshaw and both pubs at Nutclough now gone, all the others in Hebden still going strong as are the Cross and White Lion. Nutclough House Hotel was my local while it was open, I moved here in 87, used to be a good pub for quite a few years.
"The paradise of the rich is made out of the hell of the poor" - Victor Hugo

User avatar
Eric
Even further under the Table
Posts: 2873
Joined: Fri Mar 13, 2009 1:18 am
Location: Sunderland.

Re: Home grown hops 2022

Post by Eric » Sun Sep 04, 2022 10:04 pm

Brewed 50 litre Green Hop beer today. Used Brewers Gold and Challenger for bittering and 750 gm of freshly picked Bramling Cross for aroma. No idea how it could turn out.
Without patience, life becomes difficult and the sooner it's finished, the better.

User avatar
Meatymc
Drunk as a Skunk
Posts: 836
Joined: Mon Sep 01, 2014 8:36 pm
Location: Northallerton, North Yorkshire

Re: Home grown hops 2022

Post by Meatymc » Mon Sep 05, 2022 9:42 am

Eric wrote:
Sun Sep 04, 2022 10:04 pm
Brewed 50 litre Green Hop beer today. Used Brewers Gold and Challenger for bittering and 750 gm of freshly picked Bramling Cross for aroma. No idea how it could turn out.
Please let us know Eric. Too late for me to try something similar now with a holiday coming up but it's now obvious I don't use all I grow so will be cutting down on how much I harvest next year unless I try something similar.

User avatar
Eric
Even further under the Table
Posts: 2873
Joined: Fri Mar 13, 2009 1:18 am
Location: Sunderland.

Re: Home grown hops 2022

Post by Eric » Mon Sep 05, 2022 12:23 pm

Meatymc wrote:
Mon Sep 05, 2022 9:42 am
Eric wrote:
Sun Sep 04, 2022 10:04 pm
Brewed 50 litre Green Hop beer today. Used Brewers Gold and Challenger for bittering and 750 gm of freshly picked Bramling Cross for aroma. No idea how it could turn out.
Please let us know Eric. Too late for me to try something similar now with a holiday coming up but it's now obvious I don't use all I grow so will be cutting down on how much I harvest next year unless I try something similar.
Firstly, it must be said that I never have and never expected a harvest like this. Here hops do well winter and early spring, but winds normally tear the bines to shreds several times over in a season. Only once this year did that happen, early in the season and they quickly recovered. Also, hop flowering is triggered by shortening daylight, and "Up North" is a couple of weeks later than in lower latitudes, by when winter comes howlin' in, but not this year. However, despite Kent's usual weather being exported, we are on boulder clay and not soil of the Garden of England, and larger cones were harvested and those don't have the stickiness associated with good hops.

A green hop beer is a gamble, especially so with mine. Brewed one last year and at first the beer had a vegetable taste, but that quickly changed to be a little grassier than expected. I'm more hopeful this time with extra hops producing a better aroma from the FV.

I advise you get most of your bittering using hops of known AA, with maybe a top-up of your own. One advantage is the hops don't grow in the boiler like dried and compressed hops do. It is said hops are 80% water, they are probably more, particularly if you harvest them on a cool and damp day. My attempts at drying have been failures, they have always gone brown with time, so cannot even advise what weights to use, except to use plenty and follow by sparging. This will release a significant amount of goodness if done with care to retain break and debris. My hops are kept loose in the boil and there is a hop filter acting as a hopback, not a spider.

I've read of some people keeping picked hops in the freezer without drying, but cannot vouch for what happens to them when there.
Without patience, life becomes difficult and the sooner it's finished, the better.

User avatar
Meatymc
Drunk as a Skunk
Posts: 836
Joined: Mon Sep 01, 2014 8:36 pm
Location: Northallerton, North Yorkshire

Re: Home grown hops 2022

Post by Meatymc » Mon Sep 05, 2022 7:30 pm

Eric wrote:
Mon Sep 05, 2022 12:23 pm
I've read of some people keeping picked hops in the freezer without drying, but cannot vouch for what happens to them when there.
Doesn't work - can vouch for that personally.

Appreciate bittering with a known aa content makes sense but I grow mine solely for bittering. Does mean a bit of trial and error the first couple of brews using that years crop but you soon get to know the adjustment needed.

I do work based on a few of basics:

Assume I'll never get more than 75% of each varieties aa potential
Only pick when dry overnight
Don't overcram the drying tray - I use 4 50cm x 50cm homemade that take 500g each pre-drying weight sat on a frame over a 24" cool fan
Minimum weight reduction 70% - 75% preferably but not easy to get that low
Pack within 3 days absolute max
Vacuum pack in 50g bags and freeze same day

Still waiting for the cascade - reckon at least another week to 10 days - the rest will have to rot unfortunately.

User avatar
Eric
Even further under the Table
Posts: 2873
Joined: Fri Mar 13, 2009 1:18 am
Location: Sunderland.

Re: Home grown hops 2022

Post by Eric » Mon Sep 05, 2022 8:18 pm

Thanks for that, I'll not be freezing them then. I did manage to reduce some down by 75% with a hairdryer in a malt tube from a Klarstein, but others didn't go down that much in that way.

Despite being long retired, I rarely get to choose a day to hop pick, indeed the green hops were picked during the boil, and it had rained much of the night before.

I can't vacuum pack, but I did try squeezing air out of plastic bags with little success.

All in all I don't think growing hops is worth the effort when compared to commercial cost and quality, but that is true of so much in life and hobbies.

Hope the Cascade do well, I have one in a pot that does nothing and I hope to make space for it one day. I often use a small addition of Cascade at 80C to give a little extra, but not sure I'd get that effect with ones grown here.
Without patience, life becomes difficult and the sooner it's finished, the better.

User avatar
Cobnut
Drunk as a Skunk
Posts: 759
Joined: Fri Aug 24, 2018 4:23 pm
Location: Ipswich
Contact:

Re: Home grown hops 2022

Post by Cobnut » Tue Sep 06, 2022 9:51 am

I've had some success with drying homegrown hops - my own and some donated by a relative - I put them into a plastic crate lined with mesh and force dry them using a couple of cold fans. It usually takes 1-2 days to drive the weight down to c.25% of their starting weight.

As per someone else's post, they are then vacuum packed and placed in my freezer.

That said, this year's crop does not look especially promising - parts of the plants appear to have died off - but I'm sure I will harvest some hops this year: Cascade, Challenger and Prima Donna (First Gold).

No word from the relative, so unsure whether the hops on his allotment have performed well this year...

I used some of last year's crop this year and was quite pleased with them; nice and sticky with reasonable aroma.
Fermenting: nowt
Conditioning: English IPA/Bretted English IPA
Drinking: Sunshine Marmalade, Festbier, Helles Bock, Smokey lagery beer, Irish Export StoutCascade APA (homegrown hops), Orval clone, Impy stout, Duvel clone, Conestoga (American Barley wine)
Planning: Dark Mild, Kozel dark (ish), Simmonds Bitter, Bitter, Citra PA and more!

User avatar
Meatymc
Drunk as a Skunk
Posts: 836
Joined: Mon Sep 01, 2014 8:36 pm
Location: Northallerton, North Yorkshire

Re: Home grown hops 2022

Post by Meatymc » Tue Sep 06, 2022 10:37 am

Eric wrote:
Mon Sep 05, 2022 8:18 pm
All in all I don't think growing hops is worth the effort when compared to commercial cost and quality, but that is true of so much in life and hobbies.
Wouldn't argue with that. All too often what starts as a hobby becomes a bit of an obsession. The realisation this year is that I've got to the point where I'll never use all I grow and running a separate fridge/freezer primarily to store hops is a nonsense - turned it off around 6 weeks ago managing to cram a (calculated) years worth in the inside freezer. I did use the fridge bit for chilling but have gone back to no-chill so that sides no longer needed either.

If I pick any Cascade, something else will have to be binned so I think I'll probably be pulling some rhizomes up this year.

All good fun isn't it!

User avatar
Eric
Even further under the Table
Posts: 2873
Joined: Fri Mar 13, 2009 1:18 am
Location: Sunderland.

Re: Home grown hops 2022

Post by Eric » Tue Sep 06, 2022 3:01 pm

A few collected early were dried as best I could and compressed them into the tubular former from kitchen towel roll to see how well they last. I've made no contraption to dry hops as I'd not expected a crop worthy of the effort and/or expense, and I like many more hop types than the garden could accommodate.

I have a small fridge/freezer for hops and yeast, but it's going the journey with the future cost of energy and excess varieties of yeast require rationalising.

Grqwing hops are good fun, even the neighbours watch them grow, but some things are going to have to give. The way it is raining presently it will be a while before any more should be picked.
Without patience, life becomes difficult and the sooner it's finished, the better.

User avatar
Cobnut
Drunk as a Skunk
Posts: 759
Joined: Fri Aug 24, 2018 4:23 pm
Location: Ipswich
Contact:

Re: Home grown hops 2022

Post by Cobnut » Tue Sep 06, 2022 4:43 pm

Eric wrote:
Tue Sep 06, 2022 3:01 pm
The way it is raining presently it will be a while before any more should be picked.
We had a little rain overnight, but desperately need more. My garden looks more like the Sahara than anyone would like!
Fermenting: nowt
Conditioning: English IPA/Bretted English IPA
Drinking: Sunshine Marmalade, Festbier, Helles Bock, Smokey lagery beer, Irish Export StoutCascade APA (homegrown hops), Orval clone, Impy stout, Duvel clone, Conestoga (American Barley wine)
Planning: Dark Mild, Kozel dark (ish), Simmonds Bitter, Bitter, Citra PA and more!

User avatar
Eric
Even further under the Table
Posts: 2873
Joined: Fri Mar 13, 2009 1:18 am
Location: Sunderland.

Re: Home grown hops 2022

Post by Eric » Tue Sep 06, 2022 7:02 pm

Cobnut wrote:
Tue Sep 06, 2022 4:43 pm
Eric wrote:
Tue Sep 06, 2022 3:01 pm
The way it is raining presently it will be a while before any more should be picked.
We had a little rain overnight, but desperately need more. My garden looks more like the Sahara than anyone would like!
There has been an amazing summer here, unlike my previous 77 spent in this area. Good weather usually causes a sea fret at the very least, but this year the few we had happened overnight, and we would wake to damp grass. The lawn did brown, but today is mostly recovered. The tomatoes are fabulous, but they were watered and at the same time, so were the hops, something I don't normally need to frequently do.
Without patience, life becomes difficult and the sooner it's finished, the better.

Post Reply