Problems with Challenger Hops?

[fflunkchief]

Can anyone tell me what bad hops smell and/or taste like in a finished beer? I made an extract based barleywine/English strong ale with a pack of challenger pellet hops and much later an AG ESB with those same hops. I'm not the world's best brewer but both were decent, relatively well made beers. Both included other hop varieties. The only commonality, besides me, was the challenger pellets. Both beers are marred by the same funky smell and taste, both similarly described as overly and unpleasantly vegetal, not dry like hay or juicy like a powerful west coast hop with desirable plant-related characteristics (piney, fruity, grapefruit, melon, cinnamon, etc.), but like crappy green clippings from working in your yard--not at all "hoppy" and astringent rather than bitter. I've never experienced this using any other hops. I suspect it was just a bad batch but they didn't smell bad going into the boil either time. Really turned me off to challenger hops, maybe unfairly. Curious if anyone has had similar experiences with these or any other hops. Go easy on me, first time posting. Thanks guys.

 

[terrapinj]

I've used them in late additions for a special bitter with EKG and as the sole hop for 2 additions (60 and 20) in a dark mild and haven't noticed any of the above flavors/aromas

did you dry hop for an extended period of time? those descriptions are often associated with prolonged dry hopping with some varieties

 

[inthesound]

terrapinj's comments sound right on.

I recently plowed through a 5 gallong batch of ESB I made with challenger as the bittering hop and somewhere in the last 15 minutes, and a tiny bit in a dry hop. The flavor I got out of the challenger was a little spicy, but mostly kind of sweet and jammy/marmalade-y. My guess is that if you used a dry hop, that it sat on the hops for way too long. I've let dry hops go almost two weeks and never picked up any vegetal flavors, though that doesn't mean there weren't any. After my first experience using challenger, I can say that it's not the hops, unless you had some really old hops or something weird. And just to be clear, challenger won't taste anything like your west coast hops.

 

[fflunkchief]

Thank you both. I hear you on the over-doing the dry hops. Only trouble is, neither were dry hopped. The ESB fermented out quickly and cleanly and I bottled it after just over two weeks w/o going into a secondary. Wanted to preserve freshness. The strong ale was racked to secondary for conditioning (don't recall how long, but nothing ridiculous). This is what has me stumped...no reason for the funk other than bad hops unless challenger are designed to taste like cr$p (I assume not). Hops were purchased from Midwest Supplies as I recall and they've always been fine otherwise. Definitely not expecting west coast profile from UK hops---was just trying to provide a reference point for the odd taste/aroma (i.e., it did not have the heavy, dank funkiness that is desirable in hyper-hopped west coast IPAs). Appreciate the input.

 

[IanCompetent]

Could be a DMS infection - that's a common cause of overly-vegetal flavours in beer. You can usually fix this with a more vigorous boil, not covering the pot during boil or getting a quicker cool-down before racking to the primary.

Can't see it being the dry hopping or the Challenger hops. Challengers are beautiful hop - spicy with bitter orange notes and a nice floral, fruit and spice aroma. I dry hop the crap out of my beer with them and have never had the issues you've described.

Hope that this helped in some way and good luck!!!

 

[fflunkchief]

Thanks again for the responses...still not sure the root cause but at the very least I'm not biased against Challenger hops generally. Either it was a bad couple of ounces or I screwed something up. There was a looooooong gap between the two batches--hops weren't exactly fresh by the second batch but that doesn't explain the issue with the first, DMS is a possibility with the second as, while the boil was decent, it took a very long time to cool down (tried to take advantage of the sub 20 degree weather on a cold January day in Chicago and not use a lot of water with the chiller). Taste is more vegetal than the cooked corn description, but still...in the spectrum I guess. Any way, thanks all. May all of your boils be vigorous and your cool-downs quick.