As you probably know, minimizing cold-side oxidation is by far the highest priority when making hoppy beer. That alone can pretty much make or break an IPA.
I’ve been a fanatic about minimizing cold-side exposure to oxygen but I’m now starting to question some of those steps (been reading too many BruLosophies
).
For example, as I just posted earlier, I’m not sure going to the trouble of backfilling the primary fermenter with CO2 when transferring to secondary/keg is worth the trouble (though interested in any counterarguments).
Scott Janish has popularized the short and cool method of dry hopping, which is to dry hop for 2 days between 55-60 degrees after a 24+ hour soft crash at the same temperature. This is supposed to drop the yeast before dry hopping (which supposedly increases aroma) as well as prevent hop creep and hop burn.
I was actually about to post the Scott Jainish article to ask whether that is why so many now dryhop cooler and quicker:
http://scottjanish.com/a-case-for-short-and-cool-dry-hopping/#:~:text=Even at colder temperatures of,F (20°C).
I didn’t know he was also the one suggesting ‘soft crash’ and I still don’t understand why it wouldn’t be better to do a true cold crash and then warm back up to 55-60F for dry hopping?
I’m concerned enough about losing hop flavor / aroma to yeast particulate that I’m planning on crashing / settling before dry hopping (post-transfer in my case).
The only issue with this is that hop creep might occur if you ever warm the beer back up (like cans/bottles on store shelves).
Which is not a concern for me, so it sounds as though my motivation to dry hop in primary is small / non-existent. At most, I need to worry about hop creep during the few days I warm the leg up for dry hopping (one additional advantage for leg-hopping at 50 or 55F rather than 65F).
Dry hopping under pressure is usually recommended, both to prevent aromas from escaping your FV and to prevent the vacuum from crashing (I always recommend this).
I always pressurize a fresh keg to 25-30PSI to assure it’s sealed and let it drift down from there. Leaving CO2 connected for a few days of keg hoping before chilling to serving temps would not be a big deal if it provides extra insurance against a hop-creep surprise…
Many others have kept with the old school way of dry hopping, which is to dry hop for around 7 days at 68+ degrees.
Some seem to be using dry-hopping to refer to hopping in primary (or possibly secondary) while using keg-hopping to
be used for hopping in serving keg.
So are these ‘old-school’ brewers fry-hopping exclusively in primary or also in unpressurized serving kegs?
I cold-side hop my IPAs in the serving keg under pressure for 5-7 days at ~65F, so do I qualify as one of these ‘old-school’ brewers?
Brewers who use this method embrace the hop creep and let it run its course, which usually takes at least 5 days.
Ah, so hop creep suggests in primary. I’m in the serving keg under pressure at 65F for 5-7 days and never experienced hop creep (to my knowledge / awareness).
Some purposely dry hop when there is still a bit of yeast activity to speed up the hop creep.
This is what the WC Pilsner Recipe I followed was advising (Timbo).
Many of these brewers dry hop with a blow-off and don't seem to worry about losing aroma. North Park does this and they have some of the most aromatic beers.
It’s exactly all that aroma lost through the airlock that makes me question the approach. Seems like a waste of perfectly good aroma hops.
Some have said that dry hopping all the way down to 38 degrees is effective. I've recently tried dry hopping with ground up hops (for better extraction) for 2 days at 38 degrees and I was seriously disappointed (bummed, more like it). It might work for some, but to each their own.
What is it you were hoping to gain at 38F that you couldn’t get at 55-60F?
I’ve read that at serving temps (~40F) it takes longer for hop aroma to peak (~14 days).
I'm going to keep dry hopping under pressure post-fermentation at room temperature for 7 days.
After racking off of the yeast cake or in primary?
This always seems to work for me and is recommended by Yakima Chief.
Interested to read any link you have to that…
One thing to remember if you're going to dry hop under pressure is the pressure capability of your FV. I dry hop in a keg with only 4 psi (just enough to push the floating hops down into the beer) and the hop creep increases the pressure by a good amount.
Sounds like your dry-hopping process is very similar to my IPA dry-hopping process. As I stated, I pressurized to ~25PSI and left it for 5-7 days of keg agitation before crashing to serving temp and carbonating.
Perhaps I did have some hop creep going on and never noticed it. Sounds as though getting a Spunding Valve might be a wise investment…
Do you ever agitate your keg when dry hopping? I’ve never worried about ‘pushing the floating hops down into the beer’ because I usually flip and (gently) shake the keg several times per day…
Just something to be aware of. Like day_trippr said, ascorbic acid (Vitamin C) is a good thing to use to help prevent oxidation and is something I always use.
Is it important to add Ascorbic acid after dry-hopping is complete, or can it be added into primary when transferring to keg?
One of the concerns I’ve read about regarding hop creep is a return of Diacetyl - is that something you have experienced?
Between maintaining pressure at serving levels of 10-15PSI and possibly dropping dry hop temp to 55F or even 50F, hopefully yeast activity can be retarded to the point that Diacetyl is not a concern…