Recipe advice - FWH v's late Hop

[Dara]

Hi,

Have 100g of Citra that I had no real plan for other than some APA type thing.  My last beer was all late hop additions from 20mins which gave good results. This time I wanted to try some first wort hopping as I had read a bit about it and want to see what effect it would have. I've about 10-15g of each of the following open; Cascade (since last year but frozen), Amarillo and Centennial. And about 30-40g of Perle. I haven't done that many all grains and trying to get to grips with different hops and hopping techniques so this is my plan:

Grains:
Maris Otter           5.8Kg
Crystal Malt   0.15Kg
Victory Malt   0.2Kg - threw this in to see what it was like

Should give OG of around 1.054 at 25L.

Hops:
FWH                 10g-15g each of Cascade,Amarillo, Centennial
60min               Perle
10min               10g Citra
5min                 30g Citra
0min                 30g Citra
Dry hop             30g Citra

I'll aim for around 50IBU and add required amount of Perle to get it assuming the FWH hops will give an IBU contribution equivalent to a 20min addition.

Yeast - US-05.

The questions I have are:
1. Does this look like a reasonable recipe? Is it going to be a muddle of flavours?
2. Will I even taste the FWH hops. I'm figuring if FWH gives a significant effect then you should taste something from the FWH hops. I'm still on the fence about Citra so I'm hoping the other three will give somehting else - don't know what i'm expecting here. If the FWH fails then I'll have to start liking Citra.
3. Is this just plain mad / Would I be better off forgeting about FWH and use these for some other addition in the recipe or in someother beer entirely?

I mash and sparge at night, then boil the following night so the FWH will be sitting in the wort for the bones of 24hrs. I have an insulated cuboard for fermentation where I leave the wort and it tends not to drop below 50degC in the 24hrs prior to boiling.

If I have time I'll split the wort pre-boil to make a FWH only beer (around 3 to 4 litres) so that I can see what FWH really does on its own.

Dara

[mr hoppy]

I think FWH is probably more for German lagers and the like where you are primarily looking to get the bitterness out of the hops rather than any flavor. I used it on the gratzer at the meet up last week with Saaz and I was happy with the results but I'm not sure it's necessarily an alternative to late hopping.

Looking at the recipe again, I'd say it's fine to use FWH like you have but I definitely wouldn't waste something like Amarillo at this stage - as you know I'm not the expert on big hoppy beeers, but maybe you could use the Perle with the Cascade then and put the Amarillo and Centennial in late?

[halite]

Yeah, I think the benefits of FWH is that it provides a smoother bittering than early boil additions. Certainly won't have the effect of a late boil addition.

Sp use it in place of, or in conjunction with your bittering addition.

Mark

[biertourist]

Many professional brewers and brewing scientists feel that first wort hopping is just a waste of good hops.

I certainly wouldn't use good / expensive hops for first wort hopping. (Then again I wouldn't use ANY hops for FWH...)

The science just doesn't' add up with what people say about FWH; hop oils are highly volatile and are most certainly completely volatilized when used for first wort hopping; I can see it used to maximize bittering utilization but beyond that it just seems like quackery; regardless of what one German study said. (I'm blaming the placebo effect...)

-Note: I'm calling the idea that FWH leads to better hopping FLAVORS from FWH quackery; not the idea of "smoother bitterness".



Adam

[pob]

From reading around and from using it for most of my brews, I think that it adds a "rounder flavour" to the bittering.

The flavour molecules are supposed to be held/fixed in the hops at the mash ~80° temp range up to boil and are supposed to give the same flavour profile as a 20 min addition whilst giving full bittering IBUs as a 60 min addition (some calculators say +10%, others -10%; to do with actual vs perceived bitterness).

Some articles written in mid to late 2000s suggesting things like 30% of hop bill & only low Alpha Acid varieties, are now been questioned with higher AA varieties based on their flavour profiles being suggested.

A few bits worth reading/listening:

http://beersmith.com/blog/2012/12/26/for-the-love-of-hops-with-stan-hieronymus-beersmith-podcast-52/ For the Love of Hops with Stan Hieronymus – BeerSmith Podcast #52

"Despite increased bitterness, the tasting panel described the first wort-hopped beers as more pleasant tasting and overwhelmingly preferred them. Gas chromatographic analysis indicated the conventionally hopped beers contained a higher level of hop aroma substances ... but panelists nonetheless described the first wort-hopped beers as having a very fine and rounded hop aroma and rounded hop flavor." Stan Hieronymous, For the Love of Hops

Any of the other Beersmith hop podcasts with either John Palmer & Charlie Bamforth are worth a listen when you get spare time.

See http://beersmith.com/blog/2012/11/19/first-wort-hops-fwh-in-beer-revisited/ Brad Smiths First Wort Hops (FWH) in Beer Revisited for more info.

I like FWH and what it does to my brews. It would be worth trying a side by side comparison with a split batch and trying same recipe with FWH vs standard additions.

[Will_D]

I detect a PhD or MsC thesis in the offing!

What exactly does FWH acieve?

What does it add to the beer?

Simple (if you have the kit) enogh to analyse tho!

[Ciderhead]

And yez all thought the fellas in Wickla were all gobshites, Go pob

[DEMPSEY]

Read the beersmith blog and it makes for interesting reading. Goes against all that I understood about hop additions. Will like to read more and maybe try it out.

[Dara]

Interesting views on this.  The jury seems to be out. Hopefully be brewing this over the weekend. I'm leaning to just banging in the Amarillo/Cent/cascade late/dry aswell in some combination or other.  As I don't brew very often I try to do different combos'/techniques/experiments with each brew to try and understand what's going on. At this stage i'm good with brewing by numbers (IBU's/predicting gravities/attentuation etc.) but the flavour part is something that appears to be something that's going to take a lifetime - probably what makes this hobby great.  I've done a couple of side by side brews just to see what happens so would like to try this but laziness may take over as I've just polished my last bottle of homebrew and need to make something tasty quick. This is on the list of experiments to do.

Dara

[Dara]

That is where I read about it.  Seems to be a lot of conflicting views out there so that's why I wanted to give it a go.  I work as a process engineer and I get conflicting views withing the industry on my process at work all the time. In the end I find the only way to get a grasp of it is to give it a go.

Dara

[Dara]

Whoops, was attempting to Quote Dempsey re:Beersmith above.    To many Duvel's at this stage.

[RichC]

I got excellent results from FWH with an IPA. I used the method here http://www.biabrewer.info/viewtopic.php?t=1798 .
Excellent aroma and hoppiness althought there was dry hop additions also. Only late boil addition was 6g of cascade at 20mins. Recipe I used was

Fwh ipa
2.5tsp cacl and 2tsp gypsum
46g cascade 6.8 fwh
16g Amarillo 9.3 @ 60
10g cascade 6.8 @ 60
6g cascade 6.8 @ 20
Dh 30g each Amarillo and cascade
Will definitely do it again. Don't understand the science but I can tell you it worked for me.
I'm going to drop the 20min addition next time and just do FWH and dry hop additions.
Grainbill
100g Acid Malt
120g Torrified Wheat
150g carapils
4.2Kg Lager Malt
The acid malt, Cacl and Gypsum are because I'm using RO water, wheat and carapils for head retention.
Cant say I noticed a 'smoother' bitterness, would probably have to do a side by side to notice but it did make a beautiful hoppy beer!
FW hops are meant to be taken from late additions first(read thread linked above). Calculate total AAUs of recipe and remove at least 40% of those starting with the latest additions and dump them in after mashout. This leaves you with no late additions. I hope you try it and report back, it'd be interesting to hear your results. As I said, I'll be doing it again.

[pob]

Pedantic Pete here,

Sorry the link should have been to :

01-10-13 For the Love of Hops with Stan Hieronymus, on the Basic Brewing Radio podcast

About 37" to 42" there is a brief bit on FWH.

Jeez, I need a life, time for a brew then 

[Dara]

In the end curiosity got the better of me and this is what I went with on brewday.

Grains:
Maris Otter           5.8Kg
Crystal Malt   0.15Kg
Victory Malt   0.2Kg - threw this in to see what it was like

OG of around 1.056 at 25L - can't remember exactly.

Hops:
FWH                 25g Centenial/15g Cascade
60min               6g Perle
10min               10g Citra
5min                 30g Citra / Amarillo 15g
0min                 30g Citra
Dry hop             30g Citra / Amarillo 20g

It's been in the fermenter for 7 days now and tasting good. I can get a taste of Cascade/Centenial but it is very faint compared to Citra, Will dry hop this evening if the small fella goes to sleep.

Dara

[Hop Bomb]

I can get a taste of Cascade/Centenial but it is very faint compared to Citra...

Thats because you used 100g of Citra  The most you used of any other hop was 25g.  Thats a fair whack of Citra but if you really like that hop then lash it in.
I usually pair it with simcoe & or amarillo & Id always have a bit more of the other hops.

I FWH when Im trying to get some extra IBUs from my bittering hops (especially when they are a year old nearly now) Ive not noticed any negative results - beers have all been good but I doubt Id taste the difference without FWH if Im honest.