Speaking ‘fermentation’ or ‘brewing’ as a second language is often as difficult and seemingly obtuse as verb conjugations or assignment of masculine and feminine labels to nouns in many foreign languages. We talk of things such as Wort, Lees, Trub, Mashing, Sparging, Lautering, and my favorite... Vorlaufing! Cool word. Toss that one into the conversation at your next social function. The vernacular of wine and beer fermentation is an odd one, full of traditional terms often seeming to make little sense, and ‘dry hopping’ is one.

Dry hopping is the simple technique of adding hops into a beer when fermentation slows. That is typically 4 - 5 days into the fermentation, when airlock bubbling has slowed to approximately 20 to 30 second intervals (and the time would be right for transferring to a secondary vessel if you wished). The benefit of dry hopping is a more intense and fresher hop flavor and aroma. It does this largely because the hops are not exposed to heat as in a boil, which damages flavors and aromatics while extracting them. Hop flavors are similar to spice flavors and aromatics. The longer hops are exposed to the heat and moisture of boiling or steeping, the more flavors and aromas are damaged or driven off. Dry hopping allows alcohol already formed in a partially fermented beer to act as a solvent for the flavor and aromatic constituents of the hop. Without the destructive influence of heat, hop flavor and aroma are retained in the beer and it has a fresher, more vibrant character.

The alcohol in the beer serves another function as well. Since the hops are not sterile, there is no boiling hot environment to sterilize them. The alcohol kills off any wild yeasts or bacteria that may be inherent in the hops. That is why we wait until secondary fermentation time to ‘dry hop’, and then leave the hops in the beer until bottling to allow ample time for flavor and aromatic qualities to be absorbed.

Lastly, when transferring to the bottling bucket, it is highly advisable to use an extra fine mesh bag as a simple filtering device to avoid getting hops into the bottles, or clogging up your tubing and filler. It will help you avoid nasty problems and is very easy to use.