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I extract brew. After I boil the three gallons of water, I take the kettle off the stove and pour the sugars in, and stir under I'm convinced it has all been dissolved. Placing the kettle back on the stove, I wait until it boils again before I pour in the bittering hops. At this point I do stir a lot, perhaps 3-5 minutes, to make sure that no "solid" part of the hops (I get pellets) would get stuck to the bottom of the kettle.

I do not stir at any time from here to the next hop schedule, where I repeat the 3-5 minute stirring.

Should I be stirring every N minutes, or does it not matter?

Does it matter whether it is extract vs full grain?

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5

You don't need to stir regularly.

Hops, pellet or otherwise, do float around pretty freely. I have never heard of hops sticking to the bottom of the pot, nor has it ever happened to me.

I only stir occasionally to get that hop crud of the sides of the pot above the boil line back into the pot. And I stir to manage the foam early on in the process.

Otherwise your process sounds fine the way it is.

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  • I use a rubber spatula to wipe the hops crud back into the boil
    – Ugly Dude
    Mar 13 '14 at 20:53
  • 1
    If you have a good boil going, keep in mind that is pretty much doing any stirring for you as well. (Not that you need to.)
    – mpurkeypile
    Mar 21 '14 at 20:55
  • I would even say, you don't need to stir at all. At boiling temp your wort is very liquid and the boil itself does the stirring.
    – markus
    Mar 25 '14 at 19:59

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