The Bar Towel

Ready to brew my first Lager.

Looking for something crisp, clean.. not too malty.

If I were able to brew a lager, my first one would be a slightly stronger (~6 or 6.5%) dry-hopped czech pils. But I like saaz. A lot.

elproducto wrote:Ready to brew my first Lager.

Looking for something crisp, clean.. not too malty.

Brew a helles. If you mess up, you probably wouldn't notice it as much.

notdan wrote:If I were able to brew a lager, my first one would be a slightly stronger (~6 or 6.5%) dry-hopped czech pils. But I like saaz. A lot.

have you ever used saaz as a dry hop?

elproducto wrote:Ready to brew my first Lager.

Do you have the ability to ferment at 8-10C? And then lager at 0-4C?

You also need to make about a 2 gallon starter if using a single pack of fresh liquid lager yeast. I am not crazy about using dry lager yeast.

Good aeration is also important.

I ask because in my opinion these are necessities to being ready to brew a lager. ANY brewing flaw is noticable in a lager, so you need to have very sound processes.

markaberrant wrote:

elproducto wrote:Ready to brew my first Lager.

Do you have the ability to ferment at 8-10C? And then lager at 0-4C?

You also need to make about a 2 gallon starter if using a single pack of fresh liquid lager yeast. I am not crazy about using dry lager yeast.

Good aeration is also important.

I ask because in my opinion these are necessities to being ready to brew a lager. ANY brewing flaw is noticable in a lager, so you need to have very sound processes.

Yep.. I have a chest freezer, with a temp controller.

markaberrant wrote:

notdan wrote:If I were able to brew a lager, my first one would be a slightly stronger (~6 or 6.5%) dry-hopped czech pils. But I like saaz. A lot.

have you ever used saaz as a dry hop?

We used saaz and amarillo to dry-hop our Belgian IPA. I thought it turned out well.

This year's isn't as good as previous ones, but anyone know what Christoffel Nobel uses in its dry-hopping?

notdan wrote:We used saaz and amarillo to dry-hop our Belgian IPA. I thought it turned out well.

That is a different story than dry hopping a pils with saaz. There is a reason the germans and czechs don't do this.

markaberrant wrote:

notdan wrote:We used saaz and amarillo to dry-hop our Belgian IPA. I thought it turned out well.

That is a different story than dry hopping a pils with saaz. There is a reason the germans and czechs don't do this.

Good to know, we're still learning!

Is there a particular reason why pilsners shouldn't be dry-hopped? Or not with saaz in particular?

My idea was indeed inspired by Christoffel Nobel... I wonder what they dry-hopped with.

EDIT: Did a bit of googling at it seems you're right; it's rare that a pilsner is successfully dry-hopped, particularly with saaz. Good to learn this now. Taking this into consideration, my first lager will simply be a well-hopped moderately strong czech pils, sans the dry-hopping.

True noble hops just don't make for good dry hops.

There are some excellent documents out there which go into great detail describing all of the different oils present in each hop variety and at what percentage. These oils all have their own unique characteristics. However, these oils will also break down into different compounds when exposed to heat, again with their own unique characteristics.

This is why you get completely different results when dry hopping versus kettle hopping. In the case of noble hops, the character is far more appealing when used in the kettle. In fact, most euro lager brewers make their last addition with 20-30 minutes remaining in the boil.