How do you use hops in your kettle?

Curious as to how you guys use hops when brewing. I just got a dip tube attachment and whirlpooled free hops for the first time yesterday. I used to use leaf hops in nylon sacks, then moved to pellets in a hop helper when leaf hops kept getting rarer and rarer. Some guys on a local facebook homebrewers group are pretty adamant about "freeing the hops" so I thought I’d give it a try. Works pretty well, got a lot of hop residue into the fermenter but quite a lot more stayed behind.

Question can be extended to include dry-hopping technique too. Do you let the hops loose? Cold crash and rack?

I only use whole leaf, so I just throw them loose into the kettle and fermenter.

Originally posted by HornyDevil
I only use whole leaf, so I just throw them loose into the kettle and fermenter.

Pellets right into the kettle, which I then get rid of with a coarse filter.

Pellets as dry hops as well, in this case I put the bucket in the fridge for two days for the debris to sediment out.

Originally posted by HornyDevil
I only use whole leaf, so I just throw them loose into the kettle and fermenter.

I usually just use pellets for everything and then cold crash. I’ve only used whole leaf once (and back when I was still all extract). Team Leaf people: is it the ease of use or the flavor/aroma profiles you prefer?

I was team leaf until relatively recently, I liked how easy leaves are to handle as opposed to how pellets break apart and become sediment everywhere. Lately I’ve been appreciating how easy pellets are to handle in terms of the actual volume though, when handling hop waste, when trying to put hops into a carboy to dry hop, when storing hops in a small freezer, etc.

My question is how can you find/afford leaf hops. They’re almost extinct here in Canada and even ordering them from the US has become prohibitively expensive

Originally posted by JulienHuxley
when trying to put hops into a carboy to dry hop

Originally posted by humlelala

Originally posted by JulienHuxley
when trying to put hops into a carboy to dry hop

Is there any advantage at all to using a car boy as an FV over a plastic bucket given that the former has a narrow neck causing the above problem and that it normally does not have a spigot either making racking to secondary a potentially oxydating affair involving heavy lifting and risks of glass breaking?

Originally posted by italarican
Team Leaf people: is it the ease of use or the flavor/aroma profiles you prefer?

Originally posted by JulienHuxley
My question is how can you find/afford leaf hops. They’re almost extinct here in Canada and even ordering them from the US has become prohibitively expensive