Wild Hops

I was lucky enough to be jogging (ok walking) along the state park trail near my house when I noticed some wild hop vines growing out onto the trail.  Well, after close monitoring, in late September Becky and I went about harvesting some of these babies.  I realize that I have no idea if they will taste good, what their AA will be, or even if they are male or female.

Initial smell test: Citrus/Fruit

I took these home, dried them out a bit, and froze the whole pellets.  Then, I decided to make an impromptu IPA with a bunch of the random hops I'd been accumulating in the fridge before they all got too old.

I used 6 lbs of Pilsner DME and some steeping grains (can't recall which now).  I added 1/2 oz of the raw hops, 1 oz Cascade whole hops (8.9 AA), 1 oz Brewer's Gold (9.9 AA) and 1 oz Cascade pellet (6.4 AA) at 60 minutes.  I then added 1 oz Fuggles (4.2 AA) and the remaining 1/2 oz of the wild hops at 5 minutes.  This then caused this cluster:

Fail Sauce

Finally I've got it going away pretty solid now with white labs East Coast Pale Ale yeast:

I'll update once I get the first taste (before Christmas)