Hopping up your ESVA

[AnthonyR1525228508]

Just did my first go at an ESVA. Coopers OS Real Ale, Coopers Pale Ale, 1kg dextrose, 150gm crystal malt, 30g Nelson Sauvin hops.

 

Only been in the bottle for 2 weeks, but I had to try one and I am currently enjoying a great, if young beer.

 

This is also the first time I've added extra hops. Following what advice I could get from this forum, I dry hopped 30g of pellets in a tied-up chux. From what I could gather, for a 23l batch there's not much to gain from messing around so I just chucked the bag in after the water was added and chucked it out with the trub after I bottled on day 14.

 

I'm sure everyone has their favourite strategy for adding hops. Is it worthwhile adding the bag at a later stage or removing it earlier? Would that make any difference?

 

That said, my initial worries I had overdone the hopping is dissipating with every swig of beer...

[Muddy Waters]

The average punter puts their dry hops on day 3+ once the active fermentation has died down as apparently hop aroma is lost during fermentation. However PB2 suggests that this is only relevant to big batch brewers and not the average home brewer.

 

One thing (I think) everone can agree on is to leave them in to the end [cool]

 

Glad you are enjoiyng your ESVA but I would strongly enourage you to brew something else to drink and put the ESVA away to age for at least 6 months....it will get a lot better. When thinking of ageing high gravity beers such as this it is best to think in years rather than months (or weeks [pinched] ).

 

As for dry hopping in general, as you are new to hop additions, I would suggest making something like an American pale ale and adding hops. In this kind of beer the hops are king and you can really get an idea of what they add to the beer. With the ESVA there is so much going on in a flavour and bitterness sense that the hops really take a back seat.