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For the homebrewer that grows and harvests his/her own hops; how best can one approximate the alpha acids in the hops they have?

Is it worth it or should brewers stick to using home grown hops for aroma and flavor?

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1 Answer

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I was going to ask this very question on here last week but I googled and found that you basically have two options:

  1. Send your hops to a lab for analysis.
  2. Just assume your hops have the estimated AA for the variety or as provided by the seller of your rhizome. It was suggested that our tongues can't only detect IBU changes of 5 or greater, so if you're within plus/minus 0.5 AA of the average, you should be OK assuming the average.
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I really need to get into the habit of posting all my questions on here even if I find the answer online to help grow this site... – JackSmith Mar 5 '10 at 20:51
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I'd be interested to know what lab to send to because I'm growing a lot of hops. If anyone has info about this, fire away. I know of many wine analysis labs, but have never encountered a hop analysis lab. – Juanote Jul 14 '10 at 6:26

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