Help building an IPA

I tried this beer from from a smaller brewery in CA, they don't distribute here in TX so I e-mailed the head brewmaster and he said the following about it:

Malt is pretty much just 2-Row and some C-15
for a little color and flavor. Bitter addition is Magnum. Finishing and Whirlpool
hops are Cascade. Citra & Apollo for dry hop. Getting the dry hop ratio is the
secret sauce, more Citra than Apollo is where we go. Apollo can get very "garlicky"
and green onion like. Start small and work upwards on Apollo percentage.

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I know the beer is 7.3% ABV and 73IBUs Around 15 on the SRM.

The aroma of the beer is what hooked me. Bright citrus/pine without the bitterness of the beer itself overpowering the smell.

It was the Hop Riot by Highwater Brewing, maybe if you've had it you can give me some tips of the hops additions?
This would be my first time building my own brew from scratch so explanations of amounts would help. All the other extract, partial mash, and all grains i've done were from kits.

From the sounds of it, your IBU's are going to be coming almost completely from the Magnum. So you could calculate the necessary Magnum addition using a brew calculator. I can't see boiling this for more than 60 mins total. Given the ABV, I would guess you would use somewhere around 1lb. of C15 for color (like he said) and head retention. This is assuming a 5 gal batch.

Beyond that, I can only guess that you would use 1-2 oz of Cascade in the whirlpool and a total of up to 2 oz for dry hopping. These additions are really where that aroma is being developed. If you can't whirlpool, I've read about some people dropping the wort temp down to 150-180F after the boil and steeping the whirlpool hops for 10-15 mins. Never tried it myself. If it truly does have more of a citrusy/piney aroma, then the dry hop is going to be heavier on the Citra.

This is tough to "clone" completely with the limited info. But we could probably whip out a "fraternal twin".

What's your start boil size and end batch size in the primary? I would highly suggest a full volume boil with no top off water. What method are you brewing, extract, pm, or ag?

I can see this boiling for 90 min with a hefty Magnum addition. 15 SRM will be difficult to attain with just 2-row and C15... not sure what's going on there if the beer didn't also have a ton of sweetness from the crystal. Perhaps the very high bitterness balanced it out somewhat.

FYI - Citra is very tropical and melony. Apollo is very dank, piney, and marijuana-esque.

5 gallon, 5 gallon boil. Not solid on the efficiency, I think its been between 75-80% doing a modified BIAB with a 5gallon mastun. Which also brings me to a tiny limitation in that 13lbs of grain would be about my max.

bobbrews said:

This is tough to "clone" completely with the limited info. But we could probably whip out a "fraternal twin".

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Agreed. I figured it gives me a place to start, then I can start adjusting to my own tastes. It was just one IPA that really stood out in all the IPAs i've had, so something about the Magnum, Citra, and Apollo combination is "good" and I think I want to explore it.

Here's a rough draft...

90 minute full volume boil, no top off water
7 gal boil
5 gal batch
1.067 OG
1.012 FG
74 IBUs

85% Great Western 2-row
15% Great Western C15

It's not unheard of to use 15% Cara malts in an IPA, though it's not my thing. Green Flash does it for their WCIPA. I believe they also mash kind of higher than usual.

58 IBUs or about 1.0 oz. Magnum pellet 14% @ 90
1.5 oz. Cascade pellet 5.5% @ 15
2.5 oz. Cascade pellet @ whirlpool
1.0 oz. Citra @ 10 day dryhop
1.0 oz. Citra @ 5 day dryhop (5 days into the first Citra dryhop)
1.0 oz. Apollo @ 5 day dryhop (5 days into the first Citra dryhop)

WLP001 starter of adequate size

That's about 7 SRM at 75% efficiency under a 90 minute boil. So without using a touch of dark malts, I don't see how you'll get 15 SRM unless they were talking about EBC.

I was playing around with a recipe. To get roughly the ABV and IBU's you're looking for, and to get the color you want (I have to assume the 15 is EBC, not SRM), this will get you in the ballpark. The whirlpool and dry hop you'll have to play around with.

5 Gallons

12.5 lbs 2-row
1.5lbs C20
1.5oz Magnum @ 60 min
US-05/WY1056/WLP001

Full boil

7.5% ABV
73 IBU's
8SRM/15EBC

If the grain bill is too much, you could always scale this to 4 gal or even 2.5 gal.