For some brewers, dry hopping is the only way to bring out the true flavor of beer. For others, dry hopping presents an ongoing challenge—maybe because they lack the space, the equipment, the time, or don’t want to sacrifice the kinds of beer losses typically seen when dry hopping beers. 

Today, there’s SPECTRUM—a revolutionary new way to dry hop. Like FLEX^® and INCOGNITO^®, SPECTRUM is an innovative hop flavor and aroma product that’s flowable at room temperature but specifically designed for cold-side hop additions. To get a sense of the possibilities SPECTRUM offers, we recently sat down with Jack Teagle, Key Account Manager for BarthHaas, who is based in the UK.

How long has SPECTRUM been in R&D?

Jack Teagle: Oh, for a while now—4-5 years, maybe? We’ve actually been in trials with brewers for about two years though. Some of them went so well, like the trial with New Belgium, they actually have a commercial beer brewed with SPECTRUM.

What’s so exciting about it?

Jack: I hesitate to say that SPECTRUM is a ground-breaking product, but…it really is. It’s a flowable hop product that is fully dispersible on the cold side of the brewing process. Its made with 100% hops, without emulsifiers or carriers and it contains all value-adding components from the hops. It’s made to be used downstream of the whirlpool and, even though we recommend using it during secondary fermentation, you really can use it just about anywhere.

What are the benefits of liquid dry-hopping?

Jack: Well, it’s a highly dispersible product, so SPECTRUM adds flavor and aroma to beer almost instantly. Unlike pellets or whole cone hops, you don’t have to wait for the aroma compounds to transfer into the beer—that means there is no residency or contact time to worry about. And there are no extractions limits involved. 

Because it’s a liquid product, there are no hop solids that brewers have to remove as with traditional dry hopping. So, you save on process efficiency and clean up. But you also save on beer loss, since there’s no vegetative material that soaks up the beer.

Any indication as to what brewers might expect to save there?

Jack: Well, as always, we have to acknowledge there’s an incredible amount of variability in the ways that brewers brew their beer—the systems they use, the recipe they’re making. But we can safely say that brewers in our trials are improving their beer savings. 

And, like INCOGNITO^®, it’s pretty easy to dose, right?

Jack: Absolutely. We do recommend pre-dispersing it in room temperature beer if fermentation is especially cold, but SPECTRUM is a really great product for brewers who haven’t been able to dry hop in the past, either because they didn’t have the equipment or didn’t want significant beer loss. No special dosing equipment is needed, and there’s no material that needs to be removed afterward. So that’s a big gain in efficiency.

Plus, it’s highly consistent. We’re currently offering SPECTRUM in either Citra^® HBC 394 c.v. or Mosaic^® HBC 369 c.v. Both are true-to-type and we’ve standardized the oils, so you get exactly what you expect, batch to batch. 

So, why the name SPECTRUM?

Jack: Well, in trial after trial, we realized that SPECTRUM worked very well with other hop products—whether it was INCOGNITO^® or LUPOMAX^® or straight T-90 pellets on the hot side. Using SPECTRUM on the cold side gave brewers these great, rounded flavors and wholesome results. You really see the whole spectrum of hop flavors come out when you dry hopped with it. But, regardless of whether you want to cut losses or boost sensory impact—or both—I think it’s a fantastic hop product. And I think brewers are going to be very impressed with what we pulled off.

To learn more about SPECTRUM, visit our product spotlight page today. Or, if you’re ready to try liquid dry hopping at your brewery, contact your HAAS^® sales representative to request trial sizes of SPECTRUM ahead of the full commercial release coming Fall 2021.

Cheers!