IPA help for a newbie

Hi all,
I am new to this game but keen to learn and was wondering whether anyone has any suggestions for some ingredients that I acquired over christmas. I have a fairly standard 25l extract setup with basic equipment. I really like the big, hoppy American IPA's as opposed to the nutty ales that we call IPA's in the UK.

My ingredients are as follows:
1tin coopers IPA kit
1kg extra light spraymalt
1kg dextrose
100g dried Amarillo hops
100g dried chinook hops
2x packs 11.5g US-05 dried yeast

I am particularly interested in what people might suggest doing with the hops (hop tea/dry hop/both), and whether it might be worth trying some others next time (hopefully not this time, as I would rather not have to go out to the store again).

Thanks in advance!

I honestly have never made a coopers kit and don't really know what to do about pre-hopped liquid malt extract but if you've got some Amarillo and Chinook you could always dryhop with those guys. They are great IPA hops. Seems 100g is about 3.5 ounces or something like that so you have more than enough for a few batches. I dryhop IPAs with anywhere from 2-4 ounces so you could dry-hop with Amarillo and Chinook, an ounce of each, or something like 30 grams a piece if you wanted to divide those up that way.

I don't know, just shooting from the hip here.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f37/coopers-ipa-kit-modification-168188/
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f39/complete-beginners-question-coopers-ipa-kit-247251/

I didn't read either of those links but there should be some good stuff in there or at least some helpful links at the bottom.

Good luck.

Ok....so 100 grams is equivalent to about 3.5 ounces of hops......so roughly 7 oz total.....

My best "hoppy" beers have been a fairly light grain bill followed by a good late addition with a double dry hop. So I would formulate the recipe to use the chinook as the bittering addition (so say 60 minute boil) add a third of it....use most of your hops (Chinook & Amarillo as a late boil or knockout addition)...and dry hop once with about an ounce+ of Amarillo (you can add to primary for about 7 days) and then rack to a secondary and put another ounce + of Amarillo on it and keep it for roughly the same time). Simple recipes always turn out the best for me.

A tip? You may want to add some carapils to this for head retention (although most extracts already have a percentage in it). Shoot for about 7-7.5% ABV and about 75-80IBUS

Your mileage may vary, but like I said, the best hoppy "aroma bombs" have been dry hopped with an ounce or so twice per 5 gallon batch....Recently, I did a session style IPA that was all late additions and I did with Simcoe first as a DH, and then Galaxy second as a DH that I still hear about from people...it was really nice!

but with Amarillo I would use both as dry hops.....

last thing, oxygenate your wort and with 2 packs of 05 will be just fine....

trail and error.....use beer calculus online and you will get right where you need to be

Wow thanks for the detailed responses- now just got to go away and try and put it all together! Will let you know how it goes

Already got answers.

Another question on this- I have been playing around with Beer calculus, and I am struggling to get close to 7%ABV with the fermentables that I have (1.7kg Coopers IPA, 1kg extra light spraymalt, 1.3kg dextrose gets me to only 6%ABV for 5gal). Does this sound right, considering the kit instructions only call for 500g DME and 300g dextrose (albeit for a much lower ABV)?

It also only hits 4-5 SRM, which isnt so much a problem, just that the software calls for 8 SRM+ for an american IPA.

A hop schedule something like (numbers sound funny as they are roughly translated from metric):
Chinook 1oz 60
Amarillo 1.5oz 30
Amarillo 0.75oz at flameout for 15
Chinook 1oz at flameout for 15
Chinook 1oz dry hop for 7 days
Amarillo 0.75oz dry hop for 7 days

Any ideas much appreciated!

I have not used Amarillo, but grow Chinook and use it routinely. Unless I offset its Pine-O-Sol floor cleaner tendencies with a lot of caramel type steeped malts, I will not use more than 1oz (28g) for bittering (assuming a 60 minute boil). If you are using the pre-hopped LME like Coopers, don;t bother adding any more bittering hops and drop the boil time to 20 minutes. To get the “big American IPA” taste, it's definitely the back-end – last five minutes and flame out - with the classics like Cascade or Willamette. I grow them too. I have yet to build up the confidence to dry hop, as I am convinced that the odd dead spider in my vac packed and frozen homegrown stash will ruin an otherwise fine beer! I will try it soon though, as this is the key to getting that super-pucker. Plus I have been putting it off for five years. There must be a limit to wimpyness. Your malt (DME based) should be at least 5.5lbs / 2.5kg (or just under 7lbs / 3.2kg LME). That, with 30 minutes of steeping with about a pound of adjunct grains, like biscuit, amber, carapils, etc), plus use of a British or English ale yeast should land you in 7% territory. Just don't add any horsemeat (!)

Eventually, move on from pre-hopped cans and even LME. It does not keep well and is not as good as DME. The only thing better than that is all grain – and that takes quite a bit more time and equipment. Yo can have a lot of fun with a 50lb bag of DME, messing about with the extra bits.

Thanks again- having taken on board the advice here's what I'm thinking (I subbed in pale LME for the coopers kit which is hopped so I shortened the boil time to 30 mins and reduced bittering hops). Will try out the williamette etc next but want to try and use up the ingredients I already have. Any suggestions?

Style: American IPA OG: 1.069
Type: Extract FG: 1.017
Rating: 0.0 ABV: 6.81 %
Calories: 225 IBU's: 36.55
Efficiency: 70 % Boil Size: 10.00 L
Color: 10.2 SRM Batch Size: 20.00 L
Preboil OG: 1.144 Boil Time: 30 minutes

Fermentation Steps
Name Days / Temp
Primary 17 days @ 20.0°C
Bottle/Keg 14 days @ 23.3°C

Grains & Adjuncts
Amount Percentage Name Time Gravity
1.00 kg 22.44 % Extra Light Dry Extract 60 mins 1.044
1.25 kg 28.11 % Amber Dry Extract 60 mins 1.044
1.70 kg 38.23 % Pale Liquid Extract 0 mins 1.036
0.50 kg 11.22 % Fawcett Caramalt 30 mins 1.034

Hops
Amount IBU's Name Time AA %
40.00 g 19.90 Chinook 30 mins 13.00
40.00 g 10.25 Amarillo Gold 20 mins 8.50
30.00 g 2.53 Amarillo Gold 5 mins 8.50
30.00 g 3.87 Chinook 5 mins 13.00
30.00 g 0.00 Chinook 0 mins 13.00
30.00 g Amarillo Gold 7 days 8.50

Yeasts
Amount Name Laboratory / ID
2.00 pkg Safale US-05 Fermentis US-05

Additions
(none)

Mash Profile
(none)

Carbonation
Amount Type Beer Temp CO2 Vols
2.98 g Corn Sugar - Bottle Carbonation 23.3°C 1.90