Hop Harvest!
It seems like just yesterday I built my hop trellis. I've watched in awe for most of the summer as the little hop rhizomes I planted in the spring, grew and climbed their lines. Typically, the first year of hop growth does not yield flowers, or cones. Although, funny enough, of the three hop varieties I planted, Fuggles, Chinook & Kent Goldings, the Chinook bucked the trend and not only climbed the highest, they produced some beautiful cones, too.
The Chinook cones mean one thing: harvest. As this was my first harvest, I was lucky to have a resident hop harvest expert on hand, Zoe's mum, Wendy. Growing up as a young girl in Kent, England, Wendy spent several summers harvesting hops. Not being one to deny expert help and, as a means to pay off her summer lodging with us, I immediately drafted Wendy to service.
Wendy explained how, as a "teenager", she spent several weeks in the summer picking hops. Crouched on a stool in a field, Wendy pulled hops from the bine, as they passed by, and dropped them in to a wire framed basket. I'm fairly certain her work also broke several child labor laws...but in the pursuit of better beer, I'm fine with her efforts and thanked her profusely.
In order to recreate her "young adulthood" as much as possible, I pulled her up a chair and told her to "get to it".
In all seriousness, I think we both enjoyed the nostalgia. She was quick to remind me to carefully pluck the cones, as to not damage them, and I was quick to remind her of...nothing.
Holding her hand in cup, she worked her thumb and forefinger to pull the cone from the bine. She was like a well oiled machine.
In no time flat, she completed the hop harvest. As an aside, I wasn't exactly screwing off the whole time. While Wendy labored, I removed the other bines from their trells lines. It was definitely a joint effort.
After a day of drying (the hops were placed on a screen and blown by a fan after their harvest), I packaged just over 2 ounces of dried hops. Although I had originally toyed with the idea of wet hopping my next brew, I'm just happy to have something I grew in the backyard to add to my next batch. Thanks to Wendy and her Kent heritage, my next brew day will be even more special than usual.
Although the trellis now stands bare, I'm already excited to see what happens next year. Perhaps we can get Wendy over here again to help out...in a supervisory role, of course.
