Critique my Falconers Flight IPA recipe

Veedo said:

hey guys, been building some recipes for our last few brews and i am a noob at it, so i always feel it is a good idea to post them up here for critique before i go forward with brewing them. what you think?



i will also dry hop with 2 ounces of falconers flight 7 c's.

5.5 gallons 79% efficiency
OG 1.061
IBUs 61
COLOR 8.5
ABV 6.3%

BIAB mash at 152 for 75 minutes, no mash out. (been getting 79% efficiency this way)

estimated FG of 1.013

WLP001 1.5L starter made, decanting on brew day. using tastys water profile, building from RO.

Click to expand...

MagicSmoker said:

I just bottled an IPA that only used Falconer's Flight 7C's (there are other Falconer's Flight variations, apparently) for bittering, flavor and aroma. My basic recipe for 5gal into the fermenter was:

8 lb 2-row (2.0 SRM)
2 lb Munich (20 SRM)
1 lb Rye (4.7 SRM)
8 oz Caramel 40 (40 SRM)
+ 1 lb of Briess golden light DME, to hit target O.G. of 1.056

1 oz 7C's [10%] @ 60 min.
1 oz 7C's [10%] @ 10 min.
1 oz 7C's [10%] @ 5 min.
1 oz 7C's [10%] @ flameout

Projected IBU: 55.5

I used two packages of Safale US-05, oxygenated for 1 minute with pure O2 and fermented for 14 days at 68F.

Ended up with less than 4 gal. to bottle (a huge yeast cake - easily 1 gal!) and I don't like a lot of carbonation so I only used 2.5 oz of corn sugar for bottle conditioning. I sampled some of the warm/flat beer and it tasted like it could use more hops flavor. The aroma and bitterness seemed about right, though.

Oh, I adjusted my strike water pH using 2 tsp of "5.2" powder. Tampa water is very hard (300?), which isn't such a problem, but also fairly alkaline (ph 8) and my previous 4 beers have all been astringent to a varying degree. This batch seems to be much improved in this respect, but for my next batch (which will be a black IPA using Nelson Sauvin for flavor/aroma) I am going to us 80% RO water and 20% Zephyrhills spring water. Waiting to see my water report from Ward Labs first, though.

Click to expand...

nate456789 said:

How did this turn out? I am curious what flavors you can detect in it. I have never tasted a beer with the 7C's hops in it.
I brewed an APA this weekend using the Falconer's hops. They smelled awesome.
My hoping was slightly different. 60 min I used willimamette for bittering and did Falconers at 30 min, 15 min, and 1 Min.
Then I plan on dry hopping in the keg.

Click to expand...

MagicSmoker said:

I just bottled an IPA that only used Falconer's Flight 7C's (there are other Falconer's Flight variations, apparently) for bittering, flavor and aroma. ...

Click to expand...

MagicSmoker said:

Well, this one was a total disappointment, too. See quoted post for recipe. Granted, it's only been in the bottle for a little over a week, but the same weird soapy flavor that has plagued all of my beers so far was present, and that doesn't go away or get better even after 6 weeks in the bottle, so I'll be dumping this one.

Batch #6 is a "Black IPA" that is in the fermenter now. In an attempt to get rid of the weird soapy character I used RO water and built it up ala the basic water chemistry primer thread. If this doesn't work then I am selling every damn thing I bought to make beer on CL.

Click to expand...

nate456789 said:

Something is up with your process. Are you using PBW or oxy clean?
You really have to do a good rinse with those cleaners. Like triple rinse. Especially with oxy clean.
Your not running your stuff thru the dish washer are you?

Click to expand...

MagicSmoker said:

I've tried PBW, fragrance/dye-free oxyclean and fragrance/dye-free dishwashing detergent to clean stuff. I have a big outdoor sink for washing/rinsing everything so it's easy to get all the soap residue off. The guys at my LHBS think its from the water being too alkaline, hence why I just switched over to RO water for this batch. I sure hope that does the trick.

Click to expand...