BeerBorg

BRY-97 has always started slow for me, but then exploded once it got going. So you might have some fun.

mashani wrote: My hop stand beers seem to stay more stable/consistent over some age range vs. my dry hopped beers did too.

I've had the same experience as you in that regard. My hop stand beers seem to be more stable over time. And I've always kept the lid on during the hop stand, too.

Kealia wrote:

mashani wrote: My hop stand beers seem to stay more stable/consistent over some age range vs. my dry hopped beers did too.

I've had the same experience as you in that regard. My hop stand beers seem to be more stable over time. And I've always kept the lid on during the hop stand, too.

It is nice to hear that someone else is flirting with the DMS gods and winning too.

I thought the DMS thing was only a threat if the beer was covered during the boil.

It is, and you really only need 30 or so minutes for DMS to disappear. At least based on the podcasts I've listened to.

If you listen to the podcast that someone linked just the other day about manganese / oxidation, if you make it to the second half he talks about other stuff, and during that he suggests even leaving it at whirlpool temps - even uncovered - as in doing a hopstand - is likely to increase DMS. He talks about it as if "if you want some DMS like some british beers do a long whirlpool, if you don't then cool it fast" or something along those lines. Lots of folks think that no-chill brewing should create DMS (it doesn't but they insist it should). One of the reasons for "rapid cooling" was to avoid / reduce DMS. Even John Palmers How To Brew says "The wort should also be cooled quickly after the boil, either by immersing in an ice bath or using a wort chiller." in the section about DMS.

My results say otherwise, but there are plenty of people who will tell you that any DMS precursor left in your beer will turn into DMS at those temps.

There is more to it, there is a compound called DMSO (DMS attached to O2) that gets created that doesn't taste like DMS, but certain yeast strains may turn back into DMS. But it's yeast specific, so might bite you in one style where would be unnoticeable in another.

I think vigorous fermentation scrubs some DMS, but in a commercial environment in a pressurized system to capture CO2 maybe that doesn't work so well. So it may be another commercial vs. our scale issue.

I have to agree with Dave in that I have never experienced a problem with noticable amounts of DMS in my finished beers.

However, from what I have read, SMM starts to break down to DMS at 80°C/176°F and knowing that the breakdown of SMM increases dramatically at higher temps...

Boiling drive off the DMS that is produced, with longer boils being more beneficial for this.

Unfortunately, SMM continues to breakdown into DMS between 176°F-212°F...

And we are not boiling while we are whirlpooling / steeping...

From a hop perspective... At higher temps such as near boiling, more Alpha Acids are utilized, contributing to increased bitterness while driving off volitile oils and beta acids that we are looking for to aid flavor and aroma...

As the temperature of the wort drops, less alpha acids are utilized, more of the precious volitile oils and beta acids are extracted, and this continues through temperatures down to and maybe just below 160°F.

Certain oils are favored between roughly 170°F to 180°F and others at slightly lower temps such as 160°F-170°F. (Edit: And there may be some benefit below 160°F as well as I recall.)

Obviously, covering hot wort both captures oils and aromatics that would normally escape in steam but it also captures any DMS produced above 176+°F... (Trigger thought ballon with image of the the scales of justice with an ear of corn on the left and a hop cone on the right!)

So here's what I do... (Edit: And this, for me, is more about the hops as I have never experienced DMS issues in my beer prior to doing this.)

I use my wort chiller to quickly cool from boiling to 180°F... Period.

Then I cover the pot... By now, I have lost 2°F and am down to 178°F or so...

The amount of DMS that is generated while the wort cools from 178°F to 176°F is NEGLIGABLE in my experience and has never been noticed by me or anyone else when drinking my beers.

On the PLUS SIDE, I have just put my hops into a very desirable temperature range for extraction of good oils and aromatics...

Win, Win!

I have been experimenting with holding 170-175°F vs, going quickly to 165°F and or 160°F...

So far, inconclusive results but I must admit my lab conditions don't make it easy to control the experiment beyond the fact that I'm making beer!

In any case, my recommendation would be to quickly cool to below 180°F, cover and hold between 160-175°F for a length of time of your choosing (I have been trying 15-35 minutes).

Then, while still covered, cool to pitching temp.

Hope this works for y'all too!

FWIW, to avoid my house brett, I have done hop stands starting at *flameout* temps, with the lid on, letting it cool for 20 minutes on it's own, then throwing into ice bath until it gets below 140 or so before using the chiller (to make sure the blown off oils recondense back into the wort before I take the lid off). I have not gotten noticeable DMS doing that. But I am semi open fermenting with huge commercial like pitch rates that someone here describe as "an act against nature" or something like that. So no headspace pressure and very rapid starting and vigorous fermentations. So it might be as much that as anything, I dunno. I just know I don't have a DMS problem doing it.

Yup, I have too...

As I said, never had a problem and changed my method more to accomadate what I wanted from the hopstand more than anything...

It never ceases to amaze me how at our batch sizes we tend to avoid some of the problems facing commercial breweries.

BigPapaG wrote: So here's what I do... (Edit: And this, for me, is more about the hops as I have never experienced DMS issues in my beer prior to doing this.)

I use my wort chiller to quickly cool from boiling to 180°F... Period.

Then I cover the pot... By now, I have lost 2°F and am down to 178°F or so...

The amount of DMS that is generated while the wort cools from 178°F to 176°F is NEGLIGABLE in my experience and has never been noticed by me or anyone else when drinking my beers.

On the PLUS SIDE, I have just put my hops into a very desirable temperature range for extraction of good oils and aromatics...

I do the same thing but I cool down to 170 before covering and adding my hops (instead of 180). I've gotten GREAT results from this so I'll keep doing it, too.
I have no DMS in my beer that has ever been mentioned by friends, others here, brewers I've shared with, etc.

I based my temperature on the BYO article a few years back talking about hop stands.

Since I picked up the counterflow chiller and pump I put the lid somewhat on the boil kettle the last 5-10 minutes, lay my spoon across the top so it is propped open but the steam sanitizes for the most part. At flameout the lid goes on completely and I start the pump to whirlpool for about 10 minutes then start to cool, within 25 minutes I am in the fermenter. Knock on wood I have not yet had a DMS problem. I remember him saying that a vigorous boil will likely blow the DMS away.

Dawg LB Steve wrote:I remember him saying that a vigorous boil will likely blow the DMS away.

This much pretty much all the "talking heads", book authors, etc. agree upon.

It's the precursor (SMM) that is still found in the wort that hasn't been turned into DMS yet that they get a bug up their butts about. Because at any of the temps we are talking about that's supposed to get converted to DMS, and since we are no longer boiling it, that newly made DMS doesn't get blow off.

I do think that vigorous fermentation blows some off though. It may very well really be a commercial style fermenter vs. what we use kind of issue.

@ Kealia

Glad that works for you too Ron...

I usually start the hops at 180°F just to get a bit more bittering since I normally do short boil batches of 20-30 minutes.

This lets me use a little less bittering hops, and get some bittering early in the whirlpool / steep which I think softens the bittering a bit.

Then, as it cools through 160°F, I am taking advantage of the oils and aromatics... With the lid on, any that try to escape get reintegrated so again, win, win... Works for me.

@ mashani

Agreed, commercial brewers run the risk of greater SMM conversion to DMS than we do at the homebrew level. Our boil drives off any that occure during the boil phase, but anything after that is so small that it really isn't a factor in my experience.

Moreso, the quick cooling I do from boiling to 180°F or less is to reduce the amount of time the unprotected wort is sitting around as a breeding ground for other bugs... Your house brett is a good example... In my case, it's probably lacto... If anything at all...

Ok just added hop stand as an option to my process. Thanks for a great discussion on DMS etc. I love this board.

Monty

My entire mancave smells like Cascade hops right now