3-7 IAT Frozen Hops

Preserving hops by freezing them may be an idea gone that is going to go cold. According to Capital Press, a South Dakota company is trying to show that freezing instead of drying hops results in better tasting beer. The goal of the project, is to purchase hops in Idaho and freeze them at a frozen food processing plant in Nampa. Again, According to Capital Press ,the company's name is Dakota Hops and its owner, Steve Polley, applied for a specialty crop grant from the Idaho State Department of Agriculture to continue a five-year research project that is testing the brewing value of freezing hops. The $55,000 grant request was not funded but Polley said his effort continues and his research has shown that freezing instead of drying hops results in better tasting beer.

Will this concept work? Who better to answer than Idaho Hops Commission Chairman Mike Gooding with whom I had a conversation. "No, they haven't gotten it perfected yet, are you end up with is a bunch of goo. I've got some in my freezer right now and if you would like to come over and thaw them out and look at them you're welcome to. It does not work right now. I don't have the greatest of professional respect for the guys that are doing that right now."