I usually transfer my beers to secondary before I dry hop them, but am going to dry hopping this one when fermentation is about done. I think some theory is the layer of yeast and stuff at the bottom of the fermenter can absorb some of the precious hop oils, so dry hopping without them should be better. Well I will try this one in primary, crash cool for a few days and see how it goes. Anyone else dothe dry hopping in primary?
I know some of the breweries double dry hop and I red Charles Bamforth bang on about this also. Going to give it a try at some stage. Anyone have any comments?
QuoteI don't think it'll make any real difference as along a fermentation is finished before you dry hop?
This is also my understanding.
Personally I avoid the secondary as well to avoid another threat to the sanitary condition of my beer.
I've done both but I am not a huge fan of moving my beer around so I tend to stick to primary dry hopping with no problems.
Just dry hopped my latest pale ale in primary, will leave for a few days before crash cooling and bottling.
I've also found when I transfer to a bottling bucket from a dry hopped primary that the little hop debris that gets sucked across forms a nice little pile in the middle of the bucket...in case one is worried.
My current take is that a lot of people no longer bother with secondary - dry hopping at the endo of primary - say 3 days before you bottle/keg - is probably the way to go.
I have tried adding a hop bag to a keg for a pale ale - and it was fantastic -
One thing I have not tried and think could be interesting - is putting a couple of hop cones - in the bottle - could be an interesting twist on the dryhopping!
Listened to a podcast from one of the American brewers - they dry hop in primary when the OG is at 1012-1014 or when the bubbles are roughly 4 per minute, logic being a little fermentation helps gobble the O2 that the hop addition has introduced