When I do hoppy beers I tend to do a small bittering charge at 90/60 minutes, typically about 7grams of some high alpha hop like Apollo. I will then add the majority of my hops with 15 minutes left and have a large addition that I throw in at the end and let sit while I whirlpool the brew kettle. The whirlpool is typically 30 minutes, 15 spinning and 15 to settle before I start to chill. Not that the small amount of bittering hops really adds that much time or money to the batch but I am wondering if anyone has eliminated that and just add the late hops. I plan to give this a try in a couple of weeks with a Simcoe, Mosaic, Amarillo and Citra APA. What say the board!
I think what you are describing is the classic hop bursting technique is it not?
My tendency has been to avoid boiling any more plant material than is necessary and it has been working wonderfully. Meaning, I get my IBU's at 60 min. and then add a significant addition to the whirlpool @160-165ish to avoid as much isomerization as possible. Since I started brewing a couple years ago I have had two beers that had an off flavor that I am at a loss to describe. Both were hoppy beers that had a lot of hops boiled in them. Now I cannot say that too many boiled hops was the issue for sure but it is the only common thread between the two. On those two beers I reviewed my process thoroughly and can't come up with another reason for the flavor. That flavor didn't taste like any of the descriptions of common off-flavors. The closest thing I can compare it to was balsam of myrrh.
I'm getting to far off but anyways it is related I suppose to your suggested technique. Some will disagree, and I'd like to hear what they say about it, but my recent experience is that boiling doesn't do anything good for flavor.(Excepting FWH, as I don't have the experience to say one way or another on that one.)
Edited by ettels4, 08 April 2014 - 12:10 PM.