Hop Storage Techniques

Hops grow fresh on the vine in "cone" form. Fresh, whole, and leaf are various terms to describe non processed hops. They are VERY perishable. The glands that provide bittering and the aroma provided by the fresh leaves fades quickly if the hops are not stored properly. Three main factors contribute to this degradation: Oxygen, heat, and time. The first two can be dealt with pretty effectively with vacuum or nitrogen purged packages stored in the freezer, the last one is just one of those things we can't do much about. Given enough time, hops are going to degrade no matter how you store them.

Did you know that hops are harvested only once a year? Once. Harvest season is mid August through early September. This means if you buy hops in July, guess how old they are? This fact makes storing the hops paramount. Of equal importance is the form of the hops you buy. Personally, I like pellet hops much better than whole hops. I think they are a much more consistent product for the homebrewer, they are easier to store (take up less space), they are cheaper, available in more varieties, and because of their form, provide 10% more bittering potential by weight than whole hops, making them more efficient to use. I get plenty of folks who disagree with me on this preference, but I've personally seen "fresh" whole hops for sale that looked brown and smelled terrible. Finding quality whole hops is iffy at best for the homebrewer, but if that's what floats your boat, have at it.

Now, this article is actually about hop storage and some cool tools you can buy to make your hops last a long time. These gadgets will even work for those you that weren't swayed by my pellet hop argument and insist on buying whole hops. They key to effective hop storage is the elimination of heat and air. The heat part is easy for homebrewers because we can store our hops in a freezer, but the air part is a different story. Once you open the bag from the retailer and vent out the nitrogen, or lose the vacuum, what now? You almost never use the whole bag for each recipe, so how can you vacuum seal the rest?

The first tool I can recommend is a thing called a Pump-N-Seal. This is a little hand pump sold for the kitchen that is mainly used to remove the air from jars that are normally vacuum sealed when you buy them at the store. Jars for salsa, mustard, olives, baby food, etc., are perfect for the Pump-N-Seal once you clean them out. What you do is put your hops into the jar, screw the lid on, and make a small hole in the lid with a push pin. Next you take one of the little rubber flaps that comes with the Pump-N-Seal, called a Tab-Chek, and stick it over the hole in the lid. The Tab-Chek acts a check valve so air can be removed from inside the jar, but can't be drawn back into the jar. Next, you put the Pump-N-Seal over the Tab-Chek and start pumping. With just a few pumps you can draw a commercial quality vacuum inside the jar. Now store the jar in the freezer. You can reuse the jar indefinitely or until the seal under the lid wears out and it won't hold vacuum any longer. Just throw the jar away and get another one, heck, their just about free. I'll bet everyone has at least 5 in their refrigerator right now. I recommend a dilute solution of chlorine bleach to get out any residual food smells before you use the jar. You can even remove the Tab-Chek from the old lid (carefully) and stick it on the new lid.

I've got about 8 or 9 varieties of hops, all vacuum sealed in labeled jars in the door of my freezer compartment. Very convenient. I've used hops stored like this with great results up to a year after opening the initial bag. The best thing is that the Pump-N-Seal only costs about $15 and comes more than enough Tab-Cheks (about 75) to keep you in well preserved hops for years. If you happen to run out, you can buy just the Tab-Cheks for about $10 (plus shipping) for another 75 of them. Try searching Ebay for Pump-N-Seal items and you might even get them cheaper than that.

As you can see, the Pump-N-Seal is well suited for pellet hops because you can put several ounces of pellets in a salsa jar. I don't recommend the Pump-N-Seal for trying to seal in bags. The manufacturer says you can do it, but it's very iffy at best and requires more patience and dexterity than I care to put forth. It was really meant for jars and does a great job when limited to that. Those of you who insist on using whole hops, despite my convincing argument from the beginning of the article, aren't going to be able to store your hops in jars. Let's be real here. To store a couple of ounces of whole hops in a jar……well…..that's one big ole' jar. Even if you had the jar, good luck getting it into the freezer. No, the Pump-N-Seal isn't for you. You need to store your hops in plastic bags. But all hope isn't lost. You'll just need a bit more money.

I'm sure we've all see the Food Saver commercials on TV. Well, I'm here to tell you that these things work beautifully on vacuum sealing hops in plastic bags, whole hops or pellet hops. It is especially useful for whole hops because the force of the vacuum compresses the hops to about 1/4 of their "unrestrained" size, so they're much more efficient to store. The only problem is that the Food Saver is around $100 even for a basic model. If you can talk your spouse into getting it for the kitchen (I own one and it's mighty handy I tell you), then you're home free. Try looking at Sam's or Costco, they almost always have them on sale. You need to use the special bags for the Food Saver, and the bags are a bit pricey, but if you buy them on rolls and cut your own custom sized bags and reuse the them whenever possible, it's not really that bad. You can try Ebay for Food Saver related items and you can save some $$. I don't recommend the off brand bags and don't even think about using a regular Zip-Loc. The Food Saver bags are high quality oxygen barrier bags designed for the freezer. If you're frugal with how you use the bags, I doubt if you'll need to save a few cents on the off brands.

In a nutshell, stick with pellet hops for a much more consistent, stable product and a more widely available selection. They store easily and can be vacuum sealed for at least a year and still be used successfully, maybe even longer than that. Use the Pump-N-Seal to store your pellet hops in jars. If you insist on whole hops, buy at your own risk and use a kitchen vacuum sealer like the Food Saver to preserve the oh so perishable nature of your hops for as long as possible.