Hop Notes 17: A New Approach to Hop Sensory
Expert analysis to help you make better hop decisions.
I’ve always been struck by the flippancy by which most of us rub hops. Grab some pellets, rub em in our hands for a bit, smell and then make some claim as to how the hop smells, and perhaps in our minds, a judgement of if we like the hop or not, if it is “good”, or even what style we use it in…
Honestly a lot of opinions folks hold on hops are informed first, primarily, or mainly by hop rubs. For all the importance of that rub, I think our approach to it merits a closer look.
In this issue I’ll examine Descriptive Aroma Analysis (the norm) and then introduce what I’m calling Comparative Aroma Analysis (Eric’s new thing).
Comparative Aroma Analysis (CAA) started as a personal journey, trying to find a better way to describe and compare the many hop lots I analyze. I needed something easier with more impact than struggling to come up with the coolest descriptive words for what I was smelling. Plus, I’m not a great descriptive aroma sniffer.
Now CAA has grown into a concept I can share with others.
And, my favorite part, other folks are finding value in CAA. Here’s what some members of a past CAA class had to say about it:
“Helped pull my head out of trying to define what exactly I’m smelling and into a contextual approach”
“Helped me think big picture, don’t worry about what it is [that I’m smelling]”
“Liked the big picture and the consistent note taking [made possible by the snapshot layout]”
Descriptive Aroma Analysis vs Comparative Aroma Analysis
Descriptive Aroma Analysis - A Narrow Lens
Descriptive Aroma Analysis (DAA) is like looking at an elephant through a telescope from 10 feet away. You can see all the little details - but are missing the broader context. It’s intensely focused on defining narrow, specific aroma attributes of a given hop sample usually using some pre-provided lexicon.
Descriptive Aroma Analysis is also the default, it’s what we all do when we rub hops now. We are all socialized to answer two questions when we rub a hop;
1) What does it smell like?
2) Do you like it?
From that single, often flippant, rub we make judgements that impact our beers, our bottom lines, merchants, farmers and the environment.
Pros
DAA, at least appears to be a very simple process to perform, after all anyone can rub a pile of hops and try to communicate what it is they are smelling and their preference.
Accurate, consistent DAA is useful for beer recipe development and understanding a given hop sample or variety.
DAA is the standard in marketing both hops and hop attributes in beer.
Cons
DAA is easily influenced by the setting. Rubbing hops at a tradeshow? How many other smells are in there? How much does the brand of the booth, the familiarity of the reps at the booth, how many beers you’ve had, what you had for breakfast…influence your perception of aromas? And more importantly, your judgement of if you like it or not?
DAA becomes a social measuring stick in groups. Who can be the most absurdly specific? Who can peacock their sensory prowess? Plenty of opportunity for gatekeeping when rubbing hops when using DAA.
DAA rewards “good noses” and the ability to be highly specific.
Doing DAA correctly in a scientific sense requires a lot of training, effort, and usually a PhD or two. Sensory Programs based on DAA require foundational work including defining and maintaining a shared aroma lexicon that trained panelists agree upon - with more than a dozen standards based in real products. This level of process is not realistic for most craft brewers.
DAA often follows a CATA (check all that apply) approach and/or a detected/not detected binary which involves complex information sheets of various aroma descriptors, which themselves require significant training to appropriately decipher and use.
Spider charts. Spider charts are cool but what do they actually mean? How do you make one? How do you recall one pattern over another? I’ve always thought a good mnemonic device is one that someone can easily replicate from memory after their first use. Speaking for myself I cannot draw a spider chart from memory even with 12 years experience in hops.
Ultimately, the cons outweigh the pros for me. DAA is a major gatekeeping stage in accessing hop aroma analysis. To do DAA “right” costs more in time, money, and people than the majority of breweries can afford. To help mitigate these downsides major hop and ingredient companies employ excellent teams to help brewers with education and outreach. How many sessions about hop sensory have you been to at conferences over the years? And how many of the practices or techniques learned have you been able to implement in your process? I believe that ultimately most brewers would be better served with a different approach that is less resource intensive.
Comparative Aroma Analysis - Wide Lens
Comparative Aroma Analysis (CAA) takes a step back to see not only the full elephant but also the context around the elephant. CAA seeks to describe the qualities of a hop sample’s aroma vs defining specific corollaries of the aroma.
CAA does this by creating a snapshot for a hop sample. A snapshot is a simple visual tool that describes the qualities of the hop sample’s aroma using 6 opposite attributes juxtaposed on sliders. These snapshots create powerful visual memory cues tied to the even more powerful olfactory cues from rubbing. The pairing of the two leads to greater retention and recall and therefore overall effectiveness.
CAA qualities are based in the analyzer’s experience. The more experienced hop sniffer might more consistently accurately identify a “sweet” hop, but there are not wrong answers. Experience using CAA builds the sniffer’s awareness of the context of a given hop sample, the more it is used the more CAA impact can have.
Here’s a blank Comparative Aroma Analysis snapshot:
Below I provide working definitions of the 6 attributes. I include common DAA notes for each simply to provide a little bridge for your mind between what you are familiar with and the new CAA language. But it is critical that you know these are not hard rules, IE; it is entirely possible for a plum aroma hop sample to be bright.
Dark: rounder, fuller aromas, purples, blues, browns. Common Descriptive Aroma Analysis terms that tend to be dark include jammy, plum, mesquite, dank.
Bright: an aroma that pops, BOLD LETTERS, yellow, pinks, oranges. Common Descriptive Aroma Analysis terms that tend to be bright include fresh citrus, ripe stone fruit, and pineapple.
Dry: not sweet. Common Descriptive Aroma Analysis terms that tend to be dry include woody, grassy, or herbal.
Sweet: smells sweet. Common Descriptive Aroma Analysis terms that tend to be sweet include vanilla, sweet fruits, candy.
Muddy: lots going on. Imagine a D20 die, a hop with an aroma profile with 20 ‘faces’ of aroma. Layers of often conflicting aromas. A muddy hop is one that when using common Descriptive Aroma Analysis terms would be described as Citrus, Grassy, Dank, AND Pine.
Clean: one or two very obvious distinct aromas. Clear story. Very specifically smells like one particular thing. A clean hop is one that when using common Descriptive Aroma Analysis terms would be described as predominantly pink grapefruit, for example.
Here’s an example completed aroma snapshot for a hop sample that is moderately bright, dry, and very clean.
Pros
Visuals are powerful ways to recall experiences, coupled with already powerful recollection from scent CAA makes for a memorable experience.
Snapshots can be easily drawn by anyone in any notebook from memory, or even represented in type (For example D - - -| S, Dry to Sweet, with mark indicating this hop sample was quite sweet).
The lexicon is a set of 6 opposites, easy to learn and simple to remember. DAA does not require full lexicon guides, PhDs or highly trained panels.
CAA is usable by complete noobs on their first hop rub and offers value to the most accomplished hop sniffer. It is an iterative hop analysis process with every entry into the snapshot library building a stronger web for the next.
Pushes the analyzer to approach each lot as a different and distinct hop expression vs boxing it in with definitive sensory descriptions.
CAA analysis starts to show patterns, it allows the analyzer to better understand their preferences for hops in different uses.
Cons
Born out of a single non-sensory scientist trained hop-addled mind tainted by years of rubbing hops and a healthy skepticism of the way things are done.
Challenging a deeply ingrained industry norm isn’t easy. Our brains default to immediately describe and judge a hop.
CAA is a work in progress and ever evolving as more folks engage with the process.
Use Cases for Comparative Aroma Analysis
It’s easy to start to use CAA, next time you rub hops draw up the sliders and mark. Maybe you do that in your hop notebook. Maybe you type it into your phone. But that’s it. Start and then keep doing it. You’ll soon wind up with a visual repository and memory bank of hop aroma characteristics!
What good is a library of snapshots? You’ll start to see patterns in the snapshots. Maybe you gravitate towards hops with a specific snapshot. Maybe you notice for the first time just how distinct different lots of the same hop variety are.
The CAA approach can help you evolve into a post-varietal world with your hop usage, freeing up creativity by removing the barriers of variety.
CAA can also inform your selection and purchasing priorities as well as use cases. You might find that hops with bright, sweet, and clean profiles consistently hit the mark you’re looking for in your hazy IPAs. So you select for those. Or that dark, sweet, and muddy profiles are perfect for hot side WP additions and lots with that slider type are only purchased for hot side WP needs.
CAA is a flexible tool and a new way of approaching hop analysis. Changing your perspective on hops can lead to a wide range of new understandings and opportunities.
Conclusion
Descriptive Aroma Analysis and Comparative Aroma Analysis are not mutually exclusive. They have an additive relationship. In my mind, the ideal hop sensory analysis process incorporates aspects of both approaches. For most brewers however, prioritizing CAA with a sprinkling of DAA may be both more effective and easier to implement.
If you want to dive deeper into this shoot me an email. Or I’ll add that I’m hosting another virtual class on this subject on October 8th. (Use code “Iknowaguy” for 50% off your ticket).
Template
Below is an example completed pellet hop analysis sheet that incorporates DAA, CAA and hop pellet qualities, all in a simple sheet that can be three hole punched and kept in brew binders. Here’s a link to blank templates that can downloaded and printed.
More hop content:
Blake Crosby (Crosby Hops) gave his view of the current situation in the hop market in a field walk video. You almost never see this level of public communication from the leader of a major hop player.
The fine folks at CLS Farms continue to create great content on their blog, HopTalk. Here’s a recent article about the very curious impact of virus free stock on harvest timing.
HSI is seeing a small rise in popularity as brewers look to use it as a general shorthand for hop quality. Haas has an excellent deep dive into how to use HSI for good. (It’s not as straightforward as you might think).
Thanks for reading Hop Notes 17. I hope you enjoyed it. If you did, please consider subscribing or forwarding it to a friend.
That’s all for now. If you have topics you’d like to read about in Hop Notes my inbox is open 24/7: ericsannerud@gmail.com.