Heavy IPA

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infielders3

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I have not brewed this beer yet but I would like some thoughts. It will be a very heavy IPA but that's what I want. I have a new baby on the way and I gave up beer while my wife can't enjoy it with me. My plan is to make this in the meantime and enjoy something that will have plenty of hops and alcohol to preserve it (nothing like getting back to the roots of what made IPA's necessary in the first place).

Anyway, it is looking like an expensive beer so I would love some input on the recipe and if there is anything I should scale back on or try differently.

My list of ingredients are as follows:

Grains: 3 LBS
16 ounces White Wheat Malt
16 ounces Cara Pils Malt
8 ounces Munich Malt
8 ounces Crystal Malt 40

Extract: 9LBS
6 LBS Dry Light Extract
3 LBS Liquid Wheat Extract

Hops: 13 oz
4 ounces Cascade
4 ounces Simcoe
2 ounces Amarillo
2 ounces Citra
1 ounce Warrior

Other: White Labs WLP001 California Ale Yeast, 8 ounces Honey, 16 ounces Corn Sugar, 1 tsp Irish Moss, 1 tsp Yeast Nutrient

Hops Schedule:
1 oz Warrior 90 mins
1 oz Simcoe 45 Mins
1 oz Citra 30 mins

10 mins:
1 oz Amarillo
1 oz Cascade
1 oz Simcoe

1 Min:
1 oz Simcoe
1 oz Cascade

Dry Hop:
2 oz Cascade
1 oz Amarillo
1 oz Citra
1 oz Simcoe​

Planned Brew Day
Steep 1 LB White Wheat, 1 LB Cara-Pils, .5 LB Munich Malt, .5 LB Crystal 40 at 150F for 90 minutes

Bring to Boil

Add 1 Oz Warrior hops to be boiled 90 minutes
after 15 minutes of boiling Warrior FLAME OUT

Stir in 2lbs Dry Light Extract to be boiled for 75 mins

Bring to Boil for 30 minutes and then add 1 oz Simcoe Hops

boil simcoe for 15 minutes before adding 1 oz Citra Hops

15 minutes after adding Citra FLAME OUT and Stir Wort vigorously while making these additions:
add rest of Light Dry Extract (4LBS)
add 3 LBS Liquid Wheat Extract
add in 1 LB Corn Sugar
add in .5 LB Honey
add yeast nutrient
add irish moss

bring back to boil and wait 5 minutes
add 1 oz Amarillo
add 1 oz cascade
add 1 oz simcoe
boil these flavor hops for 9 minutes

add Aroma hops to the boil for 1 minute
add 1 oz simcoe
add 1 oz cascade

flame out and begin chilling wort
bring to 70 degrees and shake wort vigorously to introduce O2 then pitch yeast (white labs WLP 001 California Ale)
after five days rack to secondary and dry-hop:
2 ounces Cascade
1 ounce Amarillo
1 ounce Citra
1 ounce Simcoe


My goal is to have a very hoppy beer that will have grapefruit and citrus notes. I am hoping that the heavy hops will balance the high alcohol content.

I appreciate all suggestions and thoughts about what could ensure this is a successful brew.

Cheers!
 
Wheat malt and Munich malt need to be mashed in order for starch to sugar conversion. If you want to use them, then you need to research how to brew via Partial Mash. Without these grains included, your recipe would be an Extract brew, but it is not now.

Carapils is unnecessary when using DME/LME since these products already contain Carapils.

Hop schedule is complex and muddled. I would simplify it a bit... maybe something like a 60/15/0/DH. And hops don't help to balance out alcohol content... Malt sweetness and hop bitterness can balance each other though, but that is not what a good IIPA is IMO. They should be dry and innately bitter, with a ton of hop character, and just enough malt backbone so that you're not drinking harsh bitter hop water.

If complexity and sweetness is what you desire, then doing a partial mash beer with at least 50% grain and a higher mash temp. will help, as will about 9% total crystal malts. Additions of corn sugar and honey will boost alcohol content but also aid dryness. It doesn't seem that dryness is what you want.

You'll need to know your projected OG/FG and make a yeast starter. You can't just pitch one vial of WLP001 for a proper big beer. I recommend 3 weeks in the primary and 1 week in the secondary with dryhops. Or you can skip the secondary and dryhop in the primary.

PS - If your wife doesn't like IIPAs, then don't force her to like one. All those bittering additions will probably not sit well with her... even with a finishing gravity of 1.020. If it were me, I would brew something else that ages well.
 
thanks Bob.

I will definitely be making a starter- and actually the honey and corn sugar are in there with the intent to dry the beer out. I also might take a lb of dry extract out to bring the alcohol down some. Anything over 7% is plenty strong- not sure I need to keep it at the OG that it's projected as of now (around 1.1).

The timing for the dry-hopping was a concern of mine. Generally, I leave my brews undisturbed for several weeks before racking to a secondary or adding something to the beer but I recently read a recipe where a guy dry-hopped at five days. Seemed early to me but I figured he knew something I didn't. I would be worried about the yeast zapping some of the flavor from the hops but his response was he still wanted the yeast to be somewhat active (for reasons unclear to me) during the dry-hopping.

You are right- i have long since learned not to force the wifey to drink anything she doesn't want to. She's not a hop-head, but I am.

I may scale the hops back a tad to .5 oz additions and reduce the boil from 90 to 60.

Thank you for your helpful thoughts about the grains. That is the area of brewing that I know the least about. I actually was planning on making a mini-mash for the white wheat and munich- however I will strike the cara-pils from the bill. "Balance" probably wasn't the right word for the alcohol-hops relationship, but I do think alcohol flavors can be "covered" (although I think the relationship is more than just one of covering) by a well hopped beer. I am attempting to brew a dryer beer with a medium to medium-light body. I would prefer it not be overly malty. I chose the wheat extract and wheat malt to bring out the citrus in the hops. I am really hoping this beer will have a bite of grapefruit to it. That is my ultimate goal and why I went so crazy with the late-hop additions.

If you have any other grain suggestions that could help get me where I am trying to go I would greatly appreciate it!
 
Without adding anything to the grain discussion, I would modify that fermentation to last at least three weeks. Also, you should plug those numbers into a yeast calculator after getting the estimated S.G. to determine how big the starter should be.
 
Alright,

I have adjusted my recipe some. I have removed most of the mini-mash/steeping ingredients. I decided that the White Wheat and Munich would be more work than benefit with the amount of hopping in this brew. Now, the only grain I have planned is Crystal 40. If anyone has any other grain I should think about including PLEASE COMMENT!

I also have scaled back the hops to .5 oz additions starting at 1 hour with a .5 oz of warrior. Cutting to .5 oz's brought the IBU's way down to a palatable level.

With the changes my IBU's should weigh in at 103 instead of 177 and my OG should be around 1.08 with a FG of 1.02. I feel much better about these numbers and what the finished product should be.

I do love specialty grains because of the uniqueness they impart to the beer but I suppose I am already doing that with the hopping/dry-hopping.

Thank you for the comments!
 
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