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So I am sort of new at this. I ordered some hop bags as an add on item but have not yet used them. In the past I always dropped my hop pellets right into the boiling wort. But I plan to make a really clean and light colored hoppy ale. I plan to use Citra in both the boil and dry hopped.

In the past (without using hop bags) I have noticed a substantial ring of hops in my fermentor just above the ready to bottle beer. I have not had a hard time siphoning the beer out and leaving the hops behind, but this is my first dry hopped beer and I anticipate those may be more detrimental to clarity.

So what are the advantages and disadvantages of using a hop bag? Does everyone use them? Will it help my clarity? Will Flavor be affected? Are they more suited for the boil or dryhopping?

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Using hop bags is just for ease of use of hops. Using them in the boil pretty much depends on your system. With my system, the pickup tube will clog if I use whole hops without a bag. For that reason, I almost always use pellets in the kettle. When I use whole hops in the kettle, I increase the amount by 10% to account for the supposed loss of utilization when using bag. I always use a bag for dry hopping. Most of my dry hopping is done in the serving keg and a bag contains the hops so they don't plug the dip tube or end up in your glass. In this case, using a bag will not affect the clarity (except for the fact that it will let you avoid siphoning hops), aroma, or hop flavor. Also, sine there is no loss of utilization in this situation I don't increase the amount. Some people will weight the bag on the mistaken belief that it will keep the bag from floating. The bag will sink on its own once it gets cold. Even of you dry hop in the fermenter, weighting is unnecessary.

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  • I notice that you say "if you dry hop in the fermentor" Do people typically move to secondary before dry hopping?
    – rbreier
    Commented Oct 5, 2016 at 16:00
  • Many people do move to a secondary before dry-hopping, but it is by no means necessary.
    – Sam
    Commented Oct 5, 2016 at 16:34
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    Some people dry hop in primary on the theory that the fermentation blows out any oxygen trapped in the hops and hopefully prevent oxidizing their beer. I haven't found the entrapped O2 to be a problem and I have found unpleasant interactions between hops and yeast when dry hopping in primary. I prefer to get the beer off the yeast before dry hopping because of that. I sometimes rack to secondary and dry hop there, and if I'm bottling that's my only choice But I almost never bottle and have found that by dry hopping in the serving keg I get a stronger, longer lasting hop aroma.
    – Denny Conn
    Commented Oct 6, 2016 at 15:43
  • Good advice, I wish I had kegging equipment so I could try it that way.
    – rbreier
    Commented Oct 6, 2016 at 18:21

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