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Hop Liquor

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ucflumberjack

NewBee
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Sep 4, 2006
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So I listen to The Brewing Network a lot and on one show there was a guy who in involved in the hop industry. At some point in the interview he mentions a hop liquor. I was wondering if anybody has any ideas? So far Im thinking of going at it from three different angles....

1. make a hop tea and add it to some vodka
potential problems: it might get to bitter. its its just being mixed with vodka there will be no sweetness to balance the bitterness so I might have to add them for only like 5 mins and then again at flame out or whatever
2. add hops to a bottle of vodka for some period of time like you would make most extracts
potential problems: cant think of any, will be like any flavoring being added to booze, will have to test it every week or day or whatever to monitor the progress.
3. a combo of both 1 and 2
 
One of the more innovative bars in town concocted a great martini for a recent city wide contest. They put a couple of ounces of Columbus hops into a few bottles of Plymouth gin to macerate. The resulting green liquid was mixed with a little Vermouth and paper thin cucumber slices. I hate cucumbers but it made for a damned fine martini!

Note: macerations like this are good for extracting the flavors but not the bitterness of the hops. The alpha acids require boiling to isomerize and produce the bitterness.

There are commercial hop liquors available that do have the bitterness. Some online homebrew stores even stock them. You wouldn't know it to taste it but that is how Miller High Life escapes skunking in the clear bottle. It's a modified version of hop liquor with the mercaptan percursors removed in place of "real" hops.
 
wildaho-

When you say...

Note: macerations like this are good for extracting the flavors but not the bitterness of the hops. The alpha acids require boiling to isomerize and produce the bitterness

Do you also get the benefits of the anti-bacterial propertirs of hops?

Thanks!

Michael
 
Hops used in lambics are aged until most/all of the bitter oils have degraded, but they are still added for their anti-spoilage properties. They are boiled though, so although this doesn't specifically address the issue of the need for boiling we can say that bitterness and preservatives are decoupled.

And as Wade said, anything over 20% ABV should be microbiologically stable regardless of ingredients. Alcohol is a great (non-carcinogenic) fixative. ;)
 
I'm not so much worried about stability. Just wondering if it might be appropriate to add a touch of bitterness.
 
I've been doing some reading and exchanging some e-mails. I think the best way to make hop liquor would be to make it the way gin is made. Not sure if that means much to anybody on here since its related to distilling, but for some reason that just seems like it might work best. The heat should do a better job of getting a better more whole flavor out of it. Just putting hops into a jar of vodka would probably be more like dry hopping. I'm still going to try it soon. Just forming a hypothesis I suppose.
 
Maybe a combination of the two...If you are looking at balancing bitter and aroma maybe you could extract the bitter and flavor with the cooking process by making a tea and then cooking it down until you have a condensed extract...then add that to a neutral grain spirit along with additional hops for aroma.

Gin to my knowledge is generally either distilled or compounded...if you are thinking about compounding, then as wildaho mentioned earlier you won't be extracting the bitter only the aroma and some flavor.
 
Well I tried my hop vodka last night.

I had stuffed a pint mason jar full of whole Cascade hops then filled it up with some Vodka. I had forgotten about it for a couple weeks but then after seeing this thread yesterday I decided to try it. I poured off the liquid through a coffee filter to remove any sediment. The filter probably was not necessary as the liquid looked clear. It was however a light shade of green.

It had a strong hops aroma as well as some grass and a "bite" to the aroma.
I tried drinking it both at room temp and on ice. It was quite bitter and herbal but I could taste the hops also. It may be true that for best extraction of bitterness you need to boil but hops are bitter without boiling also. At room temp the hops and grassy aroma was over powering while trying to sip the liquid. Chilling the beverage toned down the aromas but the bitterness was even more noticeable. Without the balance of malt sweetness the hops just did not taste good. I plan to try adding some of the liquor to some IPA this evening to see if it enhances the hops in the beer or just ruins it.

If you do want to try this definitely cut down on the hops. A 1/2oz of hops in a bottle of vodka is probably more than sufficient.

Craig
 
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