The Hopinator
25 January 2021
We've got
some new kit, and the brewers are pretty pleased about it!
I's called
a SSV "Hopinator" also known
as the Hop Rocket.
Here's what
Head Brewer Ed had to say...
The Hop
Rocket is for improving our process of dry
hopping or beers. Dry
hopping is where hops are added late in the process of
fermentation, either to the cask of fermenter. By adding hops at
this stage, you
can extract huge amounts of aroma. We use this process in beers
like 24 Carat and Winter Royal where we want that
really pronounced and
assertive hoppiness.
Our old
method for dry hopping involved climbing on to the top of the
fermenters and pouring the hops into the tank. This method was ok
but we only had a limited window of when we could do it in a
fermentation (far too often on Sunday morning), it wasn't a very
efficient method of extracting the aroma, and resulted in high
losses of beer.
Our
new Hopinator allows us to infuse the oils from the
hops outside of the fermenter. This process is more controllable,
much more efficient and results in higher extraction of the aroma
from the hops, by up to 160%!
Most
importantly it means much lower losses, which means more end
product which means more beer in your glass!"
We've
already used it in a brew of 24 Carat and we'll let you know when
that batch is bottled. We're really keen to experience the
results.
Hooray for
the Hopinator!
