Harvest Time: Hop Picking and Drying!

Me and my Dad just finished drying our first picking of Cascade hops and we ended up with three dry ounces of scentilating hops from the two vines.

We started by only picking those cones starting to turn a little brown. Then we laid out the cones on a screen in a single layer, took the screen to a dry location and elevated it to allow air circulation over and under the hops. We put the screen in an area where it had just ambient air temperature, so we didn't use any sort of forced drying. It took about a week and a half to dry the cones at normal PA late-August air temperature. For storage, we put the hops in a double-freezer bag until we need them.

We left a ton of green cones for a second picking this week. With what I'm beginning to learn about wet hopping, I may have to do up an IPA using this second picking. Check out mybeerbuzz.com for a posting from Weyerbacher about their Harvest Ale that uses this technique.