Flavor hops for IPA

I am going to brew an IPA tomorrow. I plan to use a hop tea when I rack to the secondary. What varieties are good and representative of an IPA for flavoring purposes?

The standard choices would be Cascade for an American IPA, East Kent Goldings for an English version.

But the choices are practically unlimited. The only thing I wouldn't use is a more subtle, lower AA hop like Hallertau--I think it would get lost in the other bold flavors of an IPA.

American IPAs often use some combination of Cascade and Centennial for flavor--both are very citrusy. Amarillo is like Cascade on steroids. Columbus is on even crazier steriods, but also has a different flavor: clean and less citrusy, more piney than cascade, but very intense.

Willimette and Fuggle are also nice, but they lack the up-your-nose of Cascade or Amarillo, so they are better suited for English types.

Try some some Simcoe, I haves used it in the last 3 IPA's that I brewed and I love it. Just got a new order of it in the other day.

I brewed one I popped today was $$

1oz Nugget 60min
.5oz challenger 30min
.5 Halertauer 5 min
.5 Halertauer (dry hop)

It is really tasty!!!

i second the simcoe as well as any very intense aromatic hops. as said, the 'c' hops are classic for american IPAs, but there are so many good hops out there you might as well try something new.

can I ask why you want to use hop tea? Are you trying to make it super bitter? The hop aroma will come out better if you just add the leaf hops directly to the secondary.

I second the cascade and have not tried the simcoe but hear good things about it at the LHBS. Have you considered chinook? Some find it harsh but I rather like it (for both aroma and bittering).

i would just throw some hops in the secondary and ditch the 'tea' approach...any hops would work, most commonly centennial, cascade, willamette, perle, n. brewer, fuggle, east kent gold, stryian gold, simcoe, northdown, columbus...etc.

or you could mix and match, do northern brewer/cascade combo, or willamette/ek gold mix...

Man looking at most of y'all s recipes you all don't use Chinook at all. whatever the reason is y'all cant say you have brewed a American ale until you have used Chinook, anyhow I'm new to this site so I look forward to seeing some good recipes but with my tweak of adding Chinook for the ultra bittering flavor that it gives.

stavo420 said:

Man looking at most of y'all s recipes you all don't use Chinook at all. whatever the reason is y'all cant say you have brewed a American ale until you have used Chinook, anyhow I'm new to this site so I look forward to seeing some good recipes but with my tweak of adding Chinook for the ultra bittering flavor that it gives.

Click to expand...

Well, since he posted this recipe 8 years ago, maybe he has used chinook hops since then?