For the past year, Hopsteiner has been developing an in-house sensory panel to provide additional evaluation of hop varieties and products. The Hopsteiner Sensory Panel trains on a set of sixty aroma reference standards in order to correctly identify common aromas found in hops (e.g. lemon, pine, mango, rose, etc.).

Very heavy rainfall on June 2nd and 3rd caused flooding in many Bavarian hop gardens. First

As dry hopping shows increasing importance, we are extensively investigating its influence on aroma and bitterness. At the same time we have to be aware of hops as a nitrate storing plant. In the cone concentrations of nitrate can be found up to more than 1000 mg per 100 g of hops.

As of mid-December 2012, there were 2,751 breweries with active operating permits in the United States – more than any other time in American history, according to the Beer Institute, an industry research group.

The following charts show the average relative differences between lead conductance value “LCV”

We carried out tests in our pilot plant to check the influence of hop product and contact time for dry hopping. The beer we used was a moderate pale ale with 5,6 % alcohol and with a bitterness of 32 IBU. For dry hopping we added the variety Hallertau Tradition in the form of leaf hops and pellets from the same processing order (see table 1). The beer was stored at 4°C for 18 days. Sampling was done prior to dry hopping and then after 4 and 8 hours and then again after 1, 5, 7, 11, 13 and 18 days according to the numbers 1 to 10 in both diagrams. ...

As in previous years we would like to demonstrate how the contribution of hop oils to beer can vary from one crop year to another. We have chosen linalool as a representative hop aroma substance as it correlates well with the sensory impression of hoppy aroma in beer.

The Hopsteiner Guidelines 2012 will soon be published and be available at BRAU 2012 in Nuremberg. We are still working on some details of the beer production and will present the balance of World Alpha Acid Supply and Demand as soon as possible…