Hop Science

[mcgster]

Just curious if anyone out there has come across any articles discussing hop flavour / aroma extraction at temperatures below boiling.

The benefits of hop stands are widely talked about, but you are getting a sliding temperature scale as your beer chills. Recent studies on dry hoping show that flavour and aroma extraction can take place completely in as little as 30 minutes in wort at room temperature.

I'm wondering if anyone has tried a dry hop / hop stand hybrid technique

Given that you can get substantial extraction of the aroma / flavour in as little as 30 minutes i'm curious if you would notice a difference in flavour if you held the hops at a stable temperature for 30 minutes. i.e.

Hop X in wort held at 120 deg F for 30 minutes
Hop X in wort held at 140 deg F for 30 minutes
Hop X in wort held at 160 deg F for 30 minutes

My thought was that i would take 500 ml of RO, bring it up to the desired temp on the stir plate, add the hops and hold it.

Given that the extraction of flavour from hops is far from straight forward i.e. depends on the yeast present, temperature, pH etc… i would assume that this experiment would produce a different result. The question is would it be noticeable!