Codename : Westfort Chinook Hop Water (2025)

© Freepik.comI made my first batch of  hop water about a year ago, I tried a couple of more iterations, without documenting them 🙁 So I’m jumping ahead, trying to remember lessons learned as I put together this recipe. I have misplaced my 750mL carboy, so I am working with a 2L carboy, and filling it to approximately 1.89L Once I establish a recipe I like, I will properly individually bottle the hop water.

Recipe inspiration : TheBruSho Ultimate Hop Water

Ingredients 

  • 6 g Chinook hops (See brew notes below)
  • 2 L of filtered or distilled water (chlorine in home water may produce off flavours)
  • 1 ml dry ale yeast (See brew notes below)
  • 6 g of Stevia
  • 20 ml Corn (or white) sugar
  • 10 ml of lime (or lemon) juice

Vital Stats

Carbonation : 2.4

Steep Day

  • Add the water to whatever vessel you will be steeping in.
  • Add the hops directly to the water, this is called dry hopping.
  • Allow the hops to infuse at room temperature for about 6 hours, or until you get the aroma you like. 
  • Sanitise everything required for bottling.
  • Once the desired aroma has been reached, you will want to strain/filter the hop water to remove most of the gooey stuff. That is the technical term.
  • Add the both sugars directly into the bottle, add approximately half the hop water into the bottle, cap it and shake vigorously. This will ensure the sugar is dissolved completely.
  • Add the remainder of the hop water to the bottle, cap it, and shake vigorously once again.
  • Add the dry yeast directly into the bottle. It is already room temperature, wait 15 minutes for the yeast to re-hydrate.
  • Put the cap back on, and shake vigorously, yet again.
  • Add the lime (or lemon) juice, cap it, then shake vigorously one last time.
  • Add it to the shelf, and wait at least one week for it to carbonate.

Steep Notes

  • I used Chinook hops, as I like that pine taste it imparts, I regularly use it in my beer. Use whatever hops that appeal to you. Use more, use less, this is about your taste, too!
  • The declared measurement of yeast is purely a guess. I used Mangrove Jack New World Ale yeast in this case. You can use most any yeast you like.
  • Knowing the hops would absorb some water, the starting measurement of water to be slightly higher, with the anticipation it would reach the desired 1.9 L.
  • I used the Stevia to sweeten the hop water a little, as it is a non-fermentable sugar, it won’t contribute to the carbonation.
  • The selection of 6g of Stevia was arbitrary, I added 1 g at a time until I got something that was lightly sweet. Add more or less to suit your taste.
  • Using a carbonation calculator, the 20 ml of sugar was chosen to achieve the approximately 2.4 CO2-vol I am hoping for.

Brew & Tasting Notes

  • The flavour was really quite good, the lime and choice of hops worked really well.
  • The carbonation was good, could have been a little higher.
  • The artificial sweetener, not really a fan of the finishing taste.
© brēowanthorpe
The hop water after it has steeped for 6 hours, and double filtered.

Steep day : 13-Jan-2025

Pig facing left