All late hop addition APA...what constitutes "late?"

I'm going to try an American Pale Ale with all the hops added late, as is sometimes discussed by Jamil and others as a way to get a less harsh bitterness.

Grainbill:

10 lbs Maris Otter
.5 lbs Munich
.5 lbs Victory
.5 lbs Crystal 40
.5 lbs Crystal 20

est OG at 5.5 gal is 1.055

I'm going for around 40 IBU's with Centennial and Cascades.

If I add 2 oz Centennial at 20 minutes left in the boil, and some more centennial/cascades at 5 min and also at 0 minutes, I should be pretty close to the 40. The bittering Centennial will be pellets, and the flavoring/aroma centennial will be whole hops. All cascades are pellets.

For those who have done an all late hop brew, is 20 minutes for the bittering addition about right? Should I go longer with a bit less, or shorter with a bit more?

If you want bitter put some in at the start of boil, but put the most of it towards the end of boil and dry hop. I made a IIPA that was 60 IBU, but had a lot of late addition hops and dry hopping and it was outstanding!

saq said:

If you want bitter put some in at the start of boil...

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I think the point of an all-late addition is to get the same bitterness by adding more bittering hops in the last few minutes than you would at a 60 minute addition. So instead of say, 1 oz at 60 minutes to acheive 30 IBU's, you'd add 2.5 oz at 20 minutes to get the same IBU's. Those particular numbers would vary by hop of course. The idea as discussed by Jamil and others is that you get the same bittering, but it comes across as a more rounded bitterness than a full 60 minute addition.

Late is when your hop timer goes off while you were in the pooper doing Rorshack (sp) test with the exploded beer stain on the shower roof.

as to what you should do depends on how conservative you want to be with hops. The late hop is meant to get a lot of flavor and aroma into the wort at the last few minutes. It works great but is wasteful considering there are other methods (FWH, Hop Tea, etc) available to achieve the same/similar result.

StunnedMonkey said:

I think the point of an all-late addition is to get the same bitterness by adding more bittering hops in the last few minutes than you would at a 60 minute addition. So instead of say, 1 oz at 60 minutes to acheive 30 IBU's, you'd add 2.5 oz at 20 minutes to get the same IBU's. Those particular numbers would vary by hop of course. The idea as discussed by Jamil and others is that you get the same bittering, but it comes across as a more rounded bitterness than a full 60 minute addition.

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Correct, but you could use a small amount earlier in the boil to get some more IBUs and then do a big late hop (like at 5) additions to get the bitterness up more, but retain a lot of the flavor/aroma of the delicious hops.

My latest IIPA just got cracked last night and it was good. I did a 1.5oz columbus addition at 90, then did 1oz simcoe, 2oz crystal, 2oz chinook. 2oz simcoe and 2oz crystal and 2oz amarillo were dry hopped for 4 weeks and 1gal was aged on oak for 4 weeks and then blended together at the end.

I'll post the recipe shortly.

Heres my beer: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f69/legendary-oaked-iipa-87320/

StunnedMonkey said:

10 lbs Maris Otter
.5 lbs Munich
.5 lbs Victory
.5 lbs Crystal 40
.5 lbs Crystal 20

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I'd lose some of the crystal, maybe toss out the C20 and keep the C40? I did something similar and it was too much crystal, the MO and Victory are pretty strong in the malt category already so I found the caramel flavor from the crystal to be annoying.

If I add 2 oz Centennial at 20 minutes left in the boil, and some more centennial/cascades at 5 min and also at 0 minutes, I should be pretty close to the 40. The bittering Centennial will be pellets, and the flavoring/aroma centennial will be whole hops. All cascades are pellets.

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That'll work. I would use a LOT of hops for the 5 minute addition. You didn't specify how much you are thinking of using. I would probably throw in an ounce of centennial and two ounces of cascades, and another ounce of each at flameout or dry hop.

If I can ever find Summit hops under $5/oz I plan to do a 20 minute Summit IPA.

Saccharomyces said:

I'd lose some of the crystal, maybe toss out the C20 and keep the C40? I did something similar and it was too much crystal, the MO and Victory are pretty strong in the malt category already so I found the caramel flavor from the crystal to be annoying.

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Yeah. The grain bill is Jamil's, from his American Pale Ale podcast. But I'm thinking maybe he spec'd American 2-row as opposed to Maris Otter, so maybe scaling back the crystal would be prudent. He really wanted both 20L and 40L together, so maybe I can drop it down to .25 lb each when paired with the MO.

i just did something similar, here's the recipe:


the beer came out with AMAZING hop aroma and flavor (as well as nice malt depth), but there was definitely something missing. all that hop presence needed some more bitterness to back it up, which i think i could have accomplished with a small FWH or 60 minute addition.

good luck with your brew.

BierMuncher did something on this too: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f66/six-shooter-pale-ale-ag-4-5-late-addition-only-56950/ https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f12/am-i-nuts-hops-schedule-49830/

If you just want to experiment with late hop additions, do so by all means. However, if you want to save hops, I've had great results getting smooth bitterness from first wort hopping.


TL

I'm going to try a late addition bill on an APA this Saturday likely using a mix of Centennial and Cascade. I do have some Warrior but it's way heavy duty at 19%AA. I noticed Jamil's hop schedule always pair the Cent/Casc additions so that's what I'm going to try. I'll use additions at 20, 10, and zero to make my .75 BU:GU ratio.

Holy hell, 19%AA Warrior? Don't let A-B find out, they'll start using one pellet in each beechwood aging tank for their new Bud IPA!

Bobby_M said:

I'm going to try a late addition bill on an APA this Saturday likely using a mix of Centennial and Cascade. I do have some Warrior but it's way heavy duty at 19%AA. I noticed Jamil's hop schedule always pair the Cent/Casc additions so that's what I'm going to try. I'll use additions at 20, 10, and zero to make my .75 BU:GU ratio.

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Yep I'm planning to do a late hop double IPA using 50/50 cascade and centennial. I will still FWH with something (probably Horizon) to get the IBUs up, otherwise I'll have so many hops there won't be any wort left after I take out my hop bag.

Late hopping is a good way to use high AA hops that also have good flavor and aroma, like Pacific Gem. By making the first addition at 20 minutes or so, instead of 60, you can get a lot of flavor and IBUs. I did this on an all Pac Gem APA and it worked out well.

Bobby_M said:

I'm going to try a late addition bill on an APA this Saturday likely using a mix of Centennial and Cascade. I do have some Warrior but it's way heavy duty at 19%AA. I noticed Jamil's hop schedule always pair the Cent/Casc additions so that's what I'm going to try. I'll use additions at 20, 10, and zero to make my .75 BU:GU ratio.

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Same hops as me, with the same schedule. (I've changed mine to 20/10/0 instead of 20/5/0 as in the OP.) What does your grain bill look like?

Beerthoven said:

Late hopping is a good way to use high AA hops that also have good flavor and aroma, like Pacific Gem.

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I'm about to brew a late-hop Pac Gem American wheat:

5lb 2row
2lb white wheat
2lb flaked wheat
8oz C20
8oz Carapils
some rice hulls
single decoction 131-154, 1.049 @ 75% eff

.5oz Pacific Gem 16.3% 15min 10IBU
.5oz Pacific Gem 16.3% 5min 7IBU
1oz Pacific Gem 16.3% 1min 12IBU (Rager... kinda surprising!)

Nottingham

TexLaw said:

If you just want to experiment with late hop additions, do so by all means. However, if you want to save hops, I've had great results getting smooth bitterness from first wort hopping.


TL

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I'm somewhat of a beginner - what is first wort hopping?

Chriso said:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f36/first-wort-hopping-white-paper-sort-50941/

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This would only apply to All Grain brewing, correct?

i hate to bump a really old thread, but i'm getting mixed advice on this beer i plan to brew sunday. i was going to do all 'late' hopping.

i've been told i should move some of the hops up to 60 for bittering, but i thought i could get bitter late if i added enough.

thanks in advance.

4 lbs extra light dry extract @ 60
3 lbs extra light dry extract @ 5
3 lbs maris otter liquid extract @ 5

.25 oz amarillo @ 30
.25 oz amarillo @ 20
.5 oz amarillo @ 5
.25 oz simcoe @ 30
.25 oz simcoe @ 20
.5 oz simcoe @ 5
.25 oz centennial @ 30
.25 oz centennial @ 20
.5 oz centennial @ 5
.5 oz citra @ 30
1 oz citra @ 20
1 oz citra @ 5

dry hops will be an ounce each of amarillo, citra & simcoe

iirc, it's about 100 ibu and 8.5%

deepsouth said:

i hate to bump a really old thread, but i'm getting mixed advice on this beer i plan to brew sunday. i was going to do all 'late' hopping.

i've been told i should move some of the hops up to 60 for bittering, but i thought i could get bitter late if i added enough.

thanks in advance.

4 lbs extra light dry extract @ 60
3 lbs extra light dry extract @ 5
3 lbs maris otter liquid extract @ 5

.25 oz amarillo @ 30
.25 oz amarillo @ 20
.5 oz amarillo @ 5
.25 oz simcoe @ 30
.25 oz simcoe @ 20
.5 oz simcoe @ 5
.25 oz centennial @ 30
.25 oz centennial @ 20
.5 oz centennial @ 5
.5 oz citra @ 30
1 oz citra @ 20
1 oz citra @ 5

dry hops will be an ounce each of amarillo, citra & simcoe

iirc, it's about 100 ibu and 8.5%

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Buttering is all about utilization and that comes from time in the boil. I would move an oz of centennial to 60 minutes and keep the rest

thanks. i'll move some of the hops to 60 minutes.

I was thinking of doing an all Citra APA after listening to Jamils podcasts. This is what I came up with

10 lbs American 2-row
12oz Crystal 20

2oz Citra @10min
2oz Citra @0min

Came out to around 34IBU.

Anything you all would change or has anyone tried something like this. I was also toying with doing a 20min 1 oz, 5min 1oz and keep the 2oz 0min.