3 replies to this topic

[Steve Urquell]

I've bottle hopped before with a few pellets just loose and tossed in. It gushed when I opened it and the beer was full of debris. I was dorking around the other day after finding a roll of tulle my wife uses for crafts. I made some small hop bags, heat sealed the edges using my vacuum sealer and tossed in a few saaz hop cones jamming them into the bag thru a funnel then heat sealing them in.
 
Opened a beer, tossed it in and quickly capped it.
It worked great. After 5 days I opened the bottle and janked the hop bag out with tweezers as the beer tried to foam. Foaming stopped instantly and no hop debris was in my beer. Saazy goodness ensued.
 
I was doing some stuff today and decided to try it with pellets and panty hose. I made some postage stamp sized bags for 2 pellets. The hose did need to have 2 cycles of heat to seal them as one was not secure. I'll try these in a week or so and see how they work. If they sink then the next time I do this I'll thread some dental floss thru the bag and drape it over the bottle lip before I cap it.
 
Saaz bottle hopping. I could have used 1/4 of these hops. Most were floating above the beer level. I jammed the cones thru the funnel with the back end of a mixer beater.
 


Heat sealed in

 
CTZ and Aramis pellets. These bags are really small--postage stamp sized.
 

[neddles]

Very cool idea. I lol'ed at "Hop Bandits".

[Steve Urquell]

Very cool idea. I lol'ed at "Hop Bandits".

I was thinking of Skoal bandits as I was making them. I brew 7 gal batches and bottle 12ish along with the full keg. I may do this on kegging/bottling day if I want to dry hop those bottles.

 

"Hop Bandits® Just place between your cheek and gum for an out of this world experience"

[Steve Urquell]

I opened the CTZ hopped bottles and yanked the hop bags out with tweezers before they could start foaming. Tasty stuff and clear as a bell with no debris. If you want to check if you want to dry hop with a certain type of hop, this is the way to do it.