Author: Ray Found
I’ve really come to appreciate good IPA as being more than just bitter bombs hellbent on the destruction of palate and tooth enamel, and as such have started brewing this style much more often. I initially struggled to nail the aromatic intensity I perceived in fresh commercial examples and began poking around for ideas how I might accomplish this. In researching homebrew IPA recipes, I noticed many were loaded to the brim with boil and flameout hops then hit with a relatively paltry dry hop charge of about 6-12 grams/gallon, puzzling to me since this technique is known for being a huge aroma contributor. I figured the pros must be doing things differently, so I dug a little deeper and ended up discovering they commonly dry hop with somewhere between 225-450 grams/BBL, equivalent to roughly 7-14 grams/gallon, almost exactly the same as the homebrew recipes I was finding.
I began playing around with multiple variables in my quest to achieve hop aroma nirvana, focusing on things like the interplay of certain grains and hops, unique techniques for kettle hopping, different water chemistry profiles, and dry hop dosages. Finally, I was making IPA bursting with all of the tropical fruit aroma I’d been craving, it was great! But I couldn’t help but wonder, what actually made the difference? With all the tweaks I made, it was impossible to nail down if it was one variable or many that was responsible. In my mind, the increased dry hop dosages seemed the most likely reason for the improved aroma, as I started adding upwards of 36 grams/gallon. But maybe this wasn’t it, perhaps I’ve merely been wasting money by loading more hops in the dry hop than is actually beneficial. Is there a limit, a point at which dry hop additions no longer impart their delectable aromatic qualities? Only one way to find out!
| PURPOSE |
To evaluate the differences between 2 batches of the same beer hit with drastically different amounts of dry hops, one receiving 60 grams and the other 180 grams.
| METHODS |
For this xBmt, I chose to brew what has become a regular on tap at Fandhaus Bräu, MACC IPA. This was my first batch since acquiring my Barley Crusher mill and, as is often the case with firsts, I fucked up a little bit. Expecting to achieve better efficiency milling my own, I used the “scale” feature in BeerSmith to adjust my grain amounts assuming 75% efficiency, an 11% increase over what I was getting with my LHBS’ crush. It actually worked, my assumption was spot on, but only after the wort was boiling did I realize BeerSmith had adjusted all of my grain proportions, which threw off my percentages– rather than 5% Honey malt, this batch ended up with 7%, which had me worried the beer might end up a bit sweet. Only time would tell.
MACC IPA
| Batch Size | Boil Time | IBU | SRM | OG | FG | ABV |
| 11 gal | 60 min | 79 | 7.0 | 1.066 SG | 1.010 SG | 7.4 % |
Fermentables
| Name | Amount | % |
| Domestic 2-Row | 21 lbs 1 oz | 79.6 |
| Munich (10L) | 3 lbs 8 oz | 13.3 |
| Gambrinus Honey Malt | 1 lbs 14 oz | 7.1 |
Hops
| Name | Amt/IBU | Time | Use | Form | Alpha % |
| Magnum | 25 IBU | First Wort Addition | FWH | Pellet | 12.6 |
| Mosaic | 100 g/16 IBU | Flameout w/ 15 min stand | Boil | Pellet | 11.7 |
| Centennial | 40 g/5 IBU | Flameout w/ 15 min stand | Boil | Pellet | 10.2 |
| Citra | 111 g/21 IBU | Flameout w/ 15 min stand | Boil | Pellet | 13.9 |
| Amarillo | 100 g/11 IBU | Flameout w/ 15 min stand | Boil | Pellet | 8.8 |
| Mosaic | 20 g or 60 g | Dryhop 5 Days | Dry | Pellet | 11.7 |
| Amarillo | 20 g or 60 g | Dryhop 5 Days | Dry | Pellet | 10.2 |
| Citra | 20 g or 60 g | Dryhop 5 Days | Dry | Pellet | 13.9 |
Yeast
| San Diego Super Yeast | White Labs 090 | 84% | 66°F |
Water Profile
| Ca | Mg | Na | SO4 | Cl | HCO3 | pH |
| 81 ppm | 0 ppm | 0 ppm | 141 ppm | 42 ppm | 0 ppm | 5.3 |
When brew day arrived, I used BeerSmith to calculate the proper strike temp in order to hit my target mash temperature.
When the 1 hour mash was complete, I collected the sweet wort and transferred it to the kettle where it met a charge of first wort hops. The boil commenced. When the 60 minute boil timer beeped, I cut the flame and added the rather massive flameout hop addition, allowing it to steep for 15 minutes.
The wort was then chilled to just above my target pitching temp with the assistance of my bother-in-law, Robert, who used proper techniques to accomplish the task quickly and efficiently.
I then filled 2 carboys simultaneously using a doohickey I designed to ensure equal distribution of kettle trub to each fermentor.
The filled carboys were placed in my fermenation chamber and allowed to finish chilling the last few degrees to my preferred 66°F, after which the yeast was pitched. Big, healthy krausens appeared less than 24 hours later, we were off to the races!
After 5 days of fermentation that included a ramp in temp to 74°F, it was time to introduce the xBmt variable. The difference in volume the hops took up was rather striking, 60 grams looked like nothing compared to the 180 gram charge.
A few days later, FG was verified for both batches, WLP090 had been on the chew, turning in a nicely dry 1.010 FG.
Both beers were cold crashed and fined with gelatin prior to being packaged. When it came time to keg, the observable differences in trub between the batches was striking.
Both beers were force carbonated in my keezer where they sat a few days to allow particulates to settle out. The 60 gram beer appeared to clear slightly more than the batch hit with 180 grams of dry hops. The picture below exaggerates the difference a bit due to condensation (and poor lighting).
| RESULTS |
Participants for this xBmt included a mix of beer drinking friends and family, as well as an awesome group of tasters organized by Rob Neuhaus, a dude I met on the homebrewing subreddit, who I sent samples to. A huge thanks to all who lent their palates to beer science!
In all, 27 people participated in this xBmt, a sample size that would require a minimum of 14 people to accurately identify the odd-beer out in order to imply significance. Tasters, who were blind to the nature of the xBmt, received 1 sample of the beer dry hopped with 180 grams and 2 samples of the beer dry hopped with 60 grams. In the end, 15 people (p=0.007) were capable of correctly identifying the odd beer out, a result greater than what we might expect by chance, which suggests a beer dry hopped with a large amount of hops be distinguishable from a similar beer receiving a smaller dry hop charge.
The qualitative data from those participants who were correct on the triangle test yielded surprisingly boring results, with the large majority rating aroma, flavor, and mouthfeel between the beers as being somewhat similar or exactly the same, while no one experienced them as being not at all similar. In terms of overall preference, which was determined prior to the nature of the xBmt being revealed to participants, a slight majority (60%) chose the 60 gram batch over the 180 gram batch. Finally, when asked to select the beer that was dry hopped with 180 grams, 13 of the 15 tasters chose correctly.
My Impressions: My experience mirrored that of the panelists who were correct on the triangle test in that I could easily and reliably distinguish the beers by aroma alone. I found the 180 gram batch to have an extremely juicy hop aroma, while the 60 gram batch, still very aromatic, didn’t have the same saturation level. On a few occasions, when someone else was serving me a pint, I was easily able to tell which beer I was being handed, even without a comparative sample. Interestingly, after over a month in the keg, the aroma of the 60 gram batch had greatly diminished while the 180 gram batch maintained substantial hop punch.
As a quick aside, I ended up entering the 180 gram version of this beer into the Norco Fair Homebrewing Competition where, despite the BeerSmith mess-up, it placed 1st in the IPA category and 6th in the Best of Show round! I like to think it would have fared better in the BOS round with my intended grainbill, but that may very well be wishful thinking on my part.
| DISCUSSION |
It was absolutely clear to me on this that the batch dry hopped with larger quantities resulted in a beer with greater aromatic intensity. From a face-value perspective, this just makes sense, more hops equals more aroma. Taking into acccount the results of this xBmt, the comments of others, and my own personal experience, I’m comfortable saying dry hop amounts make a qualitative difference, with larger quantities producing a beer with more hop character, a beer that for my preference is a better IPA, full stop.
This xBmt left me curious about the extent to which kegging plays a role in hop aroma. In my opinion, most beer styles (with some exceptions) are best consumed fresh, IPA doubly so. Even with the 60 gram batch dry hopped at fairly low levels, I was pleased and quite impressed with the aroma when it was fresh. However, fast forward a month and the hop character had greatly diminished. Alarmingly, this timeline puts it really close to when bottle conditioned beer is just starting to be consumed for many brewers. If I was trying to create a really dynamic bottle conditioned IPA , I’d be inclined to use an extremely large dry hop charge in hopes the beer would retain more aroma by the time it was carbonated and ready for serving, as the 180 gram batch did seem to hold up better over time.
While far more data is required to say for certain whether there’s a certain limit where adding more dry hops leads to diminishing returns, I’m confident if that point exists, it’s somewhere higher than 12 grams/gallon… at least when using the hop varieties I did in the IPA recipe I did.
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43 thoughts on “exBEERiment | Impact Dry Hop Quantity Has On An American IPA”
This is great and a topic near and dear to my IPA heart!
In my personal experiences i find that hop selection fro dry hops make a huge difference too!
2 ounces of cascade aren’t the same of 2 ounces of mosaic. (mosaic is a bully and tends to push everyone else aside) Every time i cringe at throwing another ounce of dry hop for fear of imparting grassy-ness, im always impressed at the aroma and the distance it holds up!
Have you tried an Xbr testing double dry hops? (adding one addition a few days after the first addition)
If you look at the link above, there is that exact XBMT listed (double vs. single dry hop).
We have!
How did i miss that? Thanks!
Some people have suggested that fermenter geometry is a factor in dry hopping–connicals leave big piles of hops covered and unable to release their goodness into beer. Double dry hopping supposedly helps. I don’t see double dry hopping as a big loss in time, energy, or whatever, so there’s no real risk in doing it, but the xBmt suggest that it doesn’t add much to your beer, at least when you’re working in those nice PET carboys.
I’ve had issues with my conical giving of less aroma than my glass carboys. I found a fitting that should allow me to rouse the hops out of the cone with co2… in theory it should work. But I assume that is going to make a big mess
This is a great exBeeriment for me as I have been toying with super hoppy beers over the last several months. It would certainly be hard to make a really great hop-bomb IPA using bottle conditioning. That has been shown to me in my homebrew club where we split the same wort and treat our share as we see fit. I am the only one who kegs at present, and my beer is always WAY lighter in color and WAY hoppier and fresher. I can’t imagine getting a really great bottle-conditioned IPA. It’s just too long at too warm of temps. Fresh is best with hop bomb beers!
I’d love to see more exBeeriments related to dry hopping rates (and hop standing as well.) I don’t have controlled experiments, but I think hop standing gives a rich hop flavor somehow that is different from dry hopping and may hang around a bit longer. I have been dry hopping with anywhere from 0 to 2 ounces per gallon. I guarantee you will love a beer with 2 oz per gallon dry hops if you are a hop head, but is it a bit too hedonistic/wasteful? I think if you did an exBeeriment with 1 oz per gallon vs 2 oz per gallon dry hops, you would see a difference and prefer the 2 oz version, but I don’t know if maybe there is a range somewhere in between that is more cost effective and just about as good.
For high intensity hops like Citra and Mosaic, I think 0.5 oz per gallon works well, but I think other hops just need more to get enough intensity (at least for my tastes!!) I also still can’t believe your exBeeriment on fining not impacting hop character. Maybe that one was biased in that the hopping rate was lower than a hop head would use? I just did a test of my own and couldn’t believe how much better my beer had tasted before I fined it. I’d love to see another test on that with higher hopping rates.
When you do 10 gallon batches how do you control the temp of the 2 batches. It looks like you place both fermenters in one fridge/freezer and then control the temperature of one of the batches with a probe stuck to the side and insulated from the chamber? Do you use this method even when you are comparing two yeasts? I’d be worried that the two beers are slightly shifted in temperature due to the heat coming from fermentation or if there is a colder spot in the fridge maybe, such as on the floor in one area, I don’t know.
I just realized that your large addition was 180g, not 60g. Now it makes a lot more sense that it was a really hoppy beer. That is much more in line with what I have been using as a really nice amount, about 1.25 ounces per gallon. LIke I said, I’ve gone over 2 ounces per gallon too, but I’m not sure if it was wasteful or not.
excellent, thanks so much for doing this one! I’m also very curious about the same 180 g beer kegged and bottled…as most homebrewers bottle. I suppose you would have to brew the beers on different days for the timing to be right?
That would be a good exBeeriment for sure. There’s just so much oxygen pickup and warm storage that I can’t imagine it wouldn’t produce different beers. It would be fun to see how different they really are.
Maybe: the counter point is that unfiltered beer contains so much yeast to eat the O2, O2 isn’t a factor for most homebrewers. We don’t know until we test it!
I totally agree. it would fun to test. I’m just making my grand prediction that the kegged beer will blow away the bottled beer. I’ve also heard that yeast can mop up oxygen and even reverse some oxidation reactions, but why not avoid them in the first place! 🙂
I heartily disagree that O2 is not a factor for most homebrewers. If you bottle, it is an issue for you. You might not realize it. I’ve seen it over and over in my brewclub.
“can’t imagine.” oh, now you must do it! This website has repeatedly proved that statement wrong.
I don’t think we can necessarily attribute O2 problems to bottling per se, that is, it may be possible to bottle without O2 issues, nor can we attribute issues that arise in bottling but not kegging to O2. Bottles are older, stored warmer, undergo another fermentation, and other things can happen which might affect the beer.
It’s on! Someone has to do it! But, it has to be a hoppy beer. I’ll tell you this, in my brew club, every single beer that is bottled comes back darker than my beer in my keg, and I am pretty diligent about keeping oxygen out of my process. One guys beer was so different from mine I thought it was a joke. Mine was a very light orange color and hoppy as heck. His was almost brown and super malty, kind of that “homebrew” flavor you get when you first start brewing. His almost tasted like an Old Ale or something. Others who bottle come back with beers that aren’t that different, but are definitely darker. We all started with exactly the same wort. Maybe they are all just awful at bottling beer.
“A slight majority (60%) chose the 60 gram batch over the 180 gram batch.” Did this surprise you? Any specific comments from the 60g group as to why they preferred it?
That was also shocking to me. I guess the only explanation is that they preferred less hop character in their IPA? Shows my bias toward hop bomb IPAs with little to no malt character.
Honestly, by the time they get to those final questions, they’ve spent a lot of time considering things and doing the survey – I don’t read hardly anything into their perception apart from the triangle tests.
I like that one, now leave me alone!
Great xbmt! I’ve been having trouble making a really killer IPA recently and in thinking of ways to improve things I came up with a potential XBMT and I’d like to see just how apparent the results are.
Basically an IPA recipe where the variable is the temp at the end of the boil. You always seem to have a flameout/whirlpool at a lower temp for the last 10-15 mins of the boil so for this one there’d be one with a consistent boil temp and the other would drop temps down. Same recipe, normal mash, normal ferment, same dry hopping, difference being the ~20 degree difference during that 10-15 min stage of the boil.
Obviously increased temps would impart more bitterness, but would the increased temp also boil off a noticeable amount of those delicious hop oils and flavors, even if the dry hop is the same?
I’m convinced that a lot of the aroma gets lost in the keg headspace as a lot of my IPA’s and pales lose almost all aroma after a couple of weeks in the keg.
That is an interesting theory. The more headspace above the beer, the more opportunity for hoppy volatiles to extract into that headspace. It would be interesting to compare one keg of beer after maybe 1 month to the exact same beer that has been counter-pressure bottled and stored for the same time. The counter-pressure filling should minimize oxygen uptake, so it would be an ok comparison of the effect you mention.
I would love to see a similar experiment with flame out/hop stand additions. I often wonder if adding 2-4oz at flameout is waste of hops as the dry hop usually dominates.
I have been thinking about a test that I want to do for some time. I just haven’t tried it. I want to do a split batch where I draw off half of the volume before adding hop stand hops. Then, I’ll hop stand the remaining wort in the kettle. The wort I drew off before adding the hop stand hops will be dry hopped only. Then, i can compare the flavor of hop standing (both adding hops for a hot steep and the actual effect of the hot steep on the wort) with simply doing dry hopping. From my experiences, I would bet that the dry hopping is definitely the biggest bang for the buck for sure if you love pure hop flavor. However, the hop stand seems to give a different character to the beer, more of a rich, kind of sweet hoppiness. It’s hard to describe. The Rock Bottom experiment often referenced kind of answered this, but I’d like to see the effect for myself:
https://byo.com/mead/item/2808-hop-stands
It may be that it is better to dry hop alone if you want that super fresh, kind of coarse hoppiness. If you prefer a more “juicy”, rounded hoppiness, then hop standing may be for you. I like the combination of both. If I could do only one, I would probably just do dry hopping.
Oh, and just dropping in a couple ounces at flameout and chilling is not a great use of hops in my opinion, but there goes another opportunity for an exBeeriment!
As somebody who is fairly rudimentary in my brewing techniques, who hasn’t bothered with water chemistry and treatment for my brewing water (Store bought drinking water for me, always!), I’ve found that adding a couple ounces of whole or leaf hops to my keg has yielded the best hop aroma in my IPAs. I’ve even started to cut back or eliminate dry hopping all together. It’s a personal preference of course, but I’ve been very happy with the results.
Dry hopping in a keg is still dry hopping, no?
Hey brulosopher,
I’m attempting to plug this recipe into my beersmith 2.0 application and it’s calculating the IBUs differently for me. (I’m building this recipe for 5.5 gallons, so I cut everything in half. The things that are throwing my beersmith off are on the “whirlpool/flameout” hops. It’s calculating 38, 22, & 28 IBUs for Citra, Amarillo, and Mosaic respectively. A total IBU of 122. I accounted for the slightly different alpha acids, but i have no idea why it would be different? Thanks!
ignore me… i had the wrong equipment profile set up…
Consider yourself ignored!
Man, i just brewed your recipe, the flame-out smell was out of this world! Really looking forward to trying this brew, thanks for sharing! Cheers
Enjoy!
I’d love to see a 1 oz/gal vs 2 oz/gal dry hop XBMT for the dry hop. I am becoming more convinced that a huge dry hop will allow a beer to taste delicious and last for a much longer time in the keg.
Just so I understand the recipe; the kettle hops are for 11gallons, but the dry hops are for 5.5 each? So if I wanted to make this in a 5.5 batch, I would split all amounts in half, except for the dry hops, where I would choose one of the amounts?
Yes, you’ve got it.
Is this right? “…a slight majority (60%) chose the 60 gram batch over the 180 gram batch.”
More participants preferring the less hoppy/aromatic version seems counter to the rest of the findings to me.
Not everyone likes beer more hoppy. Also, Preference is almost always split.
Hey Ray, are you guys going to do a more extreme version of this some time? Maybe you could start an alternative XBMT feed of your own that focuses entirely on hops for all of us hop heads!!! I usually use closer to 50 – 60 grams/gal when dry hopping, but I’d like to see if that is a wasteful practice. Also, I’m interested in the timing of the dryhop and getting different character from shorter/longer and cooler/hotter. There is a lot to test there!
We did do temperature! https://brulosophy.com/2016/01/18/dry-hop-temperature-warm-vs-cool-exbeeriment-results/
And duration: https://brulosophy.com/2015/10/26/dry-hop-length-long-vs-short-exbeeriment-results/
Both were significant!
more!
I just listened to the Podcast about this exBEERiment. I found lots of good useful knowledge. One of the questions that I felt went unanswered was that whether a super-charged dry-hopped beer was discernible from the regular beer. Maybe I missed the point. If you are looking at the cost and the loss of beer into the keg to dry hop a beer more aggressively than you typically would then you would need to take that info to decide if it is worth the extra cost and loss. I guess my question is shouldn’t this exBEERiment have a control, a baseline to judge? In this process you cut one dry-hop down and boosted the other one up which creates an extreme variance. I think I would be more curious if you had matched the regular “tried and true” recipe vs. the boosted dry-hop. At that point could blind taste-testers tell a difference? If the amount of tasters at this point aren’t able to tell a difference between the control and the super-charged beer then I think then it is automatically not worth the extra money and loss. If they are still able to tell a difference I’m not sure how you would objectively decided if it was worth it or not from this point (depends on the drinkers preferences really). I think it would have to be a subjective poll of testers whether the drinker would be willing to pay the extra $/pint for the increased aroma and juiciness. Thoughts? Maybe a follow-up exBEERiment now that we know a large amount of dry-hop does make a difference, but at what point do the contributions diminish or when do they stop yielding a perceived difference.
I like the way you think and honestly have no clue, but I added it to the list!
Interesting good to read this, Thanks for sharing this very knowledgeable article with us.
Wanted to re-arouse this topic and tell Aaron that there are other things at play if he and others are bottling and legging the exact same beer and getting those vastly different results.
I am no pro, but I can tell you that I have bottled beer as a beginner, with extract brews, that remained at 2-4 SRM. I don’t have any fancy bottling equipment at all.
My color at bottling is nearly identical ALWAYS to my post-bottle conditioning. Either I’m a wizard, or you are suggesting issues that aren’t true.
You be the judge.