I'm half happy (due to the Titan IPA and smooth brew night) and half seething because of the hop packages I just opened while brewing my IPA tonight.

My question: should I be furious that 3 of the 4 pkgs of WGV I opened were BROWN and smelled like cheese??? One pkg was green and hoppy, the other three were not. Until tonight, I've never used WGV and I recently ordered these hops from a reputable source.

So, should I be furious or are WGV something...different.

just to continue this rant, I'm EXTREMELY pissed that *many* of my '1 oz' hop packages were .75 oz of hops and .25 oz of package. This is simply cheating the customer. I'm willing to pay extra for my 1oz of hops, but I expect 1oz. Believe me, I know that my scale is accurate and I know how to take tare weights etc. I had 2 1oz pkgs and the rest were short. I had to packages that were .5 oz. Last year, nearly every package of hops was OVER 1oz by a smidge. Has anyone else experienced this?

Like I said, I purchased these hops from a legit source (who I've used before and probably get the hops pre-packaged for them), but I'm beside myself that these companies have the audacity to rip off consumers like this.

There old, that's it! Be pissed. Whit gold V are damd good hops, I love them FWIW. I use Reloading scales, accuate or I would blow my self up and I have gottin short ozs. and long ozs. I don't know whats up with that.

I almost always get slightly overweight ounces of hops. I mean, shorting the customer is nickel a dimeing even at todays prices.

Simpledad- I would demand my money back plus new hops. If they are reputable then they will do the right thing.

There's more to it Rad, if you plan a brew with such and such IBUs and you buy for that IBU, an oz might make a differance. Had I been brewing a batch that was all planed out I be pissed. I would think that the HBS would make it up though.

I always have a bunch of hops around, and I'm flexible too. But, I hadn't thought about it thataway. Don't know what to say other than possibly postpone the brewday or brew another beer entirely. Sucks that a business feels the pinch so much they have to disrespect a loyal customer. If they have developed the habit then they'll be outta biz soon.

I'll come right out and say that the short packages were purchased from a shop, but had I.D. Caslon stickers on them. The pkges of Perle did have the shop's own stickers on them.

I had plenty of other hops (green and yummy smelling) around to make up for not being able to use the WGV, but I was really looking forward to the WGV based on their description. These hops were not labeled as I.D. Caslon.

I'm still fuming about being shorted. I can sort of understand hops going funky. Maybe the package was comprimised, or the shop didn't realize that they were old. PLENTY of reasonable explanations for funky hops; but short??? I can't get over that one.

I'm actually taking a day off of work to brew tomorrow, so I'll contact the shop and see what they have to say.

That really sucks. I'd be pissed too and I'd definitely take my business elsewhere if they don't make it right.

Actually, I think that's illegal, at least in Texas it is. The depratment of Agricultural is responsible for weights and measures here. If you sell something by weight, the scale must be certified by this department and it's the weight of the product, not the package as well.

Even if your shop does make it right, what if you were already brewing when you discovered those bad hops? Unless you're stocked up with others and willing to use alternates (which I suppose most of us are), it would have ruined the brew day and potentially wasted a batch.

In making your case with the shop, I would suggest using just such a worst case scenario to maximize your "compensation" . . . bastard people . . . they'll have to really step up to regain your trust, I'll bet.

Does the package have a date on it?
If they smell like cheese and are brown, it's a mold. The hops weren't dried thoroughly. Even a small amount of extra moisture will "turn" the hops in a vacuumed environment. And please tell me that the package was UV resistant.

In a perfect world, you would've had extra hops on hand and were able to return those funky hops. That sucks and you did nothing wrong. Absolutely, go back and talk to over face-to-face with the seller.

Simpledad-are you growing your own hops this year?

Correction:
I didn't see that you were using "pellets". So yes. Probably just old like stated earlier. I believe flowers have more of a tendancy to "turn" rather than pellets.

Yes, I was already brewing, but I did have plenty of hops around to finish it as an IPA. However, I didn't have anything that sounded like the descriptions of WGV. I ended up with Challenger and Tradition in it instead.

I still have the hops and the pkgs, I'll check the dates. Like I said, one of the 4 was good. If hops weren't so expensive, I wouldn't even worry about it, but between the bad hops and the light packages, it's like $15 or so.

On the good side, I'm sitting outside brewing a dubbel right now with a wit on deck for after lunch. It's a beautiful day off of work here in KC.

Austin Homebrew by any chance? I bought a bunch of Saaz from them a while back, and EVERY single package was significantly short. Oh and I have NO problem saying their names right up front, and you shouldn't either. People need to be called out for their flakiness and incompetence whenever possible. And old hops.. I'd be pissed. Doesn't surprise me though.

Not Austin, Midwest.

dang and i thought those were some very well known good sellers there. i will make sure to weigh all my hops now. thanks for the heads up guys. and yes i would be poed too.

Looked through some notes(repicpes) and the last time I got WGV was from Midwest and they
weighed 1.5 ozs. each, 2 packs. They had LDCarl on them so really not totaly Midwest fault.They were green though cause I used them.

simpledad,

Because of your post I decided to randomly check some of the hops packages in my shop. Randomly pulled around twenty 1 oz hop bags from the frig and put them on the scale, one at a time. I found that every one of the bags measured in at over one ounce. The average appeared to be around 1.3 ounces per bag. The sample bags consisted of hops packaged from both L. D. Carlson and Crosby and Baker. The bags, minus hops, are less than one ounce.

Based on this random sample I would say that most of the bagged ounces of hops available are truely more than one ounce of hop pellets.

Thinking back though, It has been a very long time since I've been able to get WGV from L. D. Carlson.

Here's hoping that your next hop purchase is a little more accurate.

I got a 10 lb bag of flaked maize from my lhbs a few years ago that was only 7.5 lbs. It came that way from C&B. The lhbs owner made it right for me and I was only using 5 lb immediately so it didn't ruin my brewday. Don't know if he got compensated from C&B or not.

My experiance in the past with hops is that more times than not it's over an ounce. And if you've ever ordered from Hops Direct they sell brewers lbs. Sometimes several oz s over a lb.

I ran into the same &*%$ one time, but not with WGV. I just shell out the cash for pounds, its cheeper than 4 bucks and ounce, and I have never had problems with the pounds, but I have had ounces come up short or repackaged and stinky.