Advice for a dry hopping newbie.

[JonA]

Having only tried dry hopping once when I spent ages extracting hop stalks from my pump impellor, I need some guidance please as to the correct procedure. In particular:

1. For a 50 litre batch, what is a good starting point for the quantity of dry hops, say Goldings for example (assuming this is a good variety to use)
2. I ferment in the primary for about 7 days or until FG is about right, then pump into a keg, so at what point do I add and remove the dry hops. I don't really want them to end up in the keg as I think they will block up my dispensing tap.
3. How long should they be left in contact with the beer to do their thing.
4. Should they be loose or in some kind of bag.

Thanks for any advice.

Cheers,
Jon

[Rick_UK]

My advice would be to use about 10g per 23l batch, more for a big hop aroma. I stick em in a hop bag once primary fermentation has finished and leave for about a week before bottling/kegging. Obviously I remove the hop bag during the racking to a bottling bucket or keg.

I've read other members recommending hop tea as an alternative, haven't tried this me sel though.

Rick

[Beer O'Clock]

Definitely bagged. I use anything up to 40g when dry hopping (depending on mood and hop). Weight the bag down and leave for 7-10 days.

[Befuddler]

The variety of hops will depend on the beer you're brewing. I generally only dry hop my IPAs, and I tend to use American varieties for aroma in those. For a 50l batch, I think 50g would be my starting point, but up to 4x that wouldn't be excessive in a big shitkicker of an IPA. Be aware that large amounts of hops will soak up large amounts of beer though. Also be aware that I am a hop monster, and my amounts may not be to your taste.

You need to wait for the primary fermentation to settle down, then give them 7-10 days to work their magic. You can either put them in a bag and weigh it down (it'll take a lot more weight than you think to make them sink - I use shot glasses boiled for 15 mins to sanitise), or fit some kind of filter to the FV and chuck them in loose. Don't try to syphon or pump from the FV without a filter if you've put them in loose - That will be quite frustrating.

BTW, if you don't want to buy a special 'hop bag', a new pair of ladies tights will work well. Make sure you wink at the checkout operator when you buy them.

[JonA]

Thanks for the replys - and the hoisery buying advice

Just to clarify, I normally leave the beer in the FV for about a week, but if I'm leaving the dry hops in for 7-10 days after the primary fermentation has slowed, should I be racking the beer off the yeast sediment and into another container at that point when I add the hops - or else the beer will be sitting on the yeast for quite a while before it goes into the barrel. Or is this not a problem, only I've read somewhere about getting off flavours if the beer sits on the yeast sediment /trub etc. for too long.

Cheers, Jon

[Befuddler]

An extra week on the trub won't make much difference, it only starts to matter with really long contact times. Racking it off is just an unneeded infection risk imo.