Brewing hoppy beers for longevity

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Permalink Reply by Crusader-Rob on February 6, 2015 at 9:48am

Really well put. I'm currently looking into CO2 purging and keeping beers away from Oxygen at all time after oxygenation. I keg condition most of my beers, and once carbonated, and I consder them at their peak. I put all of them in what I call my conditioning fridge.

Those links I posted above are exactly where I want to take my hoppy beers, purge kegs, rack to keg for dryhopping, then rack to another keg from there. All under co2 pressure, to prevent oxygen pickup.

In my mind co2 protection is probably the most important part in keeping that freshness for longer. I would suggest you'd get at least 50% extra shelf life if you co2 protect the beer, and more if you cold conditioing as well. If your a big fan of hoppy beer invest in kegging, people say its time saving etc. But the real advantage is beer spoilage, no overcarbing issues, no sediment in bottles, consistent cold conditioning. The increase in shelf life tends to pay for itself pretty quickly. 

Read the articles above, they're really good. and while you may not be able to afford or do all of the steps, any steps you can do with the minimal amount of effort I'd suggest doing.

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Permalink Reply by Peter Smith on February 5, 2015 at 3:07pm

you could just drink it all at its peak and have a decent train of fermentors to replace it.....  I have a lot more friends dropping over now i have kegs.....   oxygen is only your friend at start of ferment after that its all down hill...   I am starting to play with no dry hop until beer has been kegged for 4 weeks cold AND carbed then dry hop for a week cold and drink. so far its had very good results

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Permalink Reply by Cain Harland on February 6, 2015 at 10:07am

On the kegging topic does any one have a source for cheap CO2 cylinders that looks to be the biggest cost in getting started. Once I had the bottle and a cheap old fridge, I could just put 1 tap to start with and have just 1 or 2 kegs and build the rest up over time.

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Permalink Reply by DMAC on February 6, 2015 at 3:31pm

Cheapist is to find a co2 fire extinguisher and convert it. I got an extinguisher from a buddy an converted it with a total cost of about $120 for a valve, test and fill at survivetec in freeman's bay Auckland. There's a reasonable number of old 3.5kg co2 extinguishers around made by carbonic ice that make good candidates. Other good option is a second hand one off trade me. Sometimes go for about 150.

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Permalink Reply by Des Ross on February 6, 2015 at 8:30pm

Only problem with fire extinguishers with a foot attached, is they have to be retested every 2 years..... Gets a little expensive. The rationale being that the weld has potential to sweat on the inside and corrode...I have one but don't use it for this reason and use 2 x 5kg cylinders which although a little moor expensive initially, require less frequent testing.

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Permalink Reply by Nathan on February 6, 2015 at 8:52pm

Not all have feet on them......but thats a good thing to know when looking......both mine are 5 year tests which i think is great value.....

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Permalink Reply by Damon Colbert on February 9, 2015 at 12:56pm

FireCorp in Penrose (Neilson St) can also help out with extinguisher conversions.  You'll need to obtain the correct valve (like this http://www.galprostylex.co.nz/shop/CYLINDER+VALVES/High+Pressure+Cy...) and they should be able to supply an old CO2 cylinder, test, fit the valve and fill it for a reasonable price.

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Permalink Reply by Ralph on February 6, 2015 at 10:03am

If you want long lasting hoppy then getting rid of the yeast in the bottle and the oxygen out of your process are the 2 big things.

I have now had experience of 2 different big IPA beers that the batch was split and some of the batch was bottle conditioned and some was keg carbonated. In both cases the keg carbed beers had much bigger hop aroma and flavour. The bottle conditioned ones had little aroma and quite good flavour but with some of the hop flavour smoothed out a bit. The keg conditioned beers stayed hoppy in the refrigerated keg for a couple of months without losing too much flavour and aroma. 

One batch I brewed specifically for an IPA comp. I sent both the keg conditioned and the bottle conditioned version to the competition. The keg conditioned came 2nd in the comp with a good high score (about 40 from memory) while the bottle conditioned same beer scored really badly with a 12 or so... reading the score sheets you would not believe that it was from the same batch of beer.

Having said all that there are some theories out there about hop flavours combining with other stuff when yeast is active leading to longer lasting flavour and aroma... but damned if I can figure out how to make the yeast and hop flavours work properly...

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Permalink Reply by Peter Smith on February 6, 2015 at 12:42pm

I gave up. I will bottle stouts and bitters, porters etc even saison,  but I could not get bottle carbed beers to hold that hoppy hit on first sip, at best they became bitter pale ales around week 6-8...  taste ok week 3-4.

And kegging allows you to modify the carb level when needed,  cant remember how many batches came out too hi carb, quite a few tho....  less with 1272 then us05 I found it would reawaken in the bottle.

Brewshop has recon cornys with new lids $95... good deal considering a new lid.   

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Permalink Reply by DMAC on February 6, 2015 at 1:55pm

And those cornys from brew shop have pull ring relief valves which help when purging with co2. On the down side they're a mixed bag of subtlely different coke kegs.

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