Pale Ale - To dry hop or not

I bought a SNPA clone and it came with 2oz. of Perle and 2oz. of Cascade. Directions call for a 60 min. boil on perle w/ a two minute boil on the cascade. I was considering maybe holding 1oz. to 1/2oz. of cascade out of the boil and dry hopping instead. Any ideas if this will be better? If so would you go with 1oz. or 1/2 oz.?

I would say if you bought a kit, you should probably follow the directions and tinker later.

But... here is a clone recipe on BYO:

Brew Your Own: The How-To Homebrew Beer Magazine - Sierra Nevada Pale Ale Clone -

which calls for dry hopping with 1/2 oz. of cascades in secondary.

EDIT: But if you take out hops from the boil, you will end up low on IBUs, so that is a risk.

If you take the 2 miunute addition out of the boil, you wont see any change in IBUs. You wont be extracting bitterness out of them at that point. Id do the recipe as it states though, and add an ounce or so to the secondary on top of the regular recipe! YUM!
Otherwise, I would not be worried about removing some fo the 2 minute addition, 1oz. that is mainly an aroma addition anyway. I am surprised to see an APA without dry hop!

But if only take 1/2oz. out of the last 2 minutes of the boil your IBU's should not suffer that much? Aren't hop additions in the last 2 to 5 minutes for aroma only? I am new to this so bare with me.

flyingyahoo said:

But if only take 1/2oz. out of the last 2 minutes of the boil your IBU's should not suffer that much? Aren't hop additions in the last 2 to 5 minutes for aroma only? I am new to this so bare with me.

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You are new, but you are correct! Hops from 5 minutes and under will not contribute to your total IBUs. Those are aroma hops only. If you want to take 1oz and dry hop with it, do it... it will not hurt anything. Just in case, send me several bottles for testing prior to drinking it yourself.

Id do the recipe as it states though, and add an ounce or so to the secondary on top of the regular recipe! YUM!
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Had not thought about that but it does sound good. Will it have to much hop aroma?

I am using the SNPA clone kit from midwest supplies.

Too much hop aroma?... how much do ya like hops? If in doubt, take an ounce from the late boil addition and dry hop with that... I have the BYO Sierra Nevada Clone posted in my recipes, and it calls for a dry hop too.

flyingyahoo said:

I was considering maybe holding 1oz. to 1/2oz. of cascade out of the boil and dry hopping instead. Any ideas if this will be better? If so would you go with 1oz. or 1/2 oz.?

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I did exactly that. Held 1oz back from one of late additions (flame-out I think) and decided to dry hop it. It's still in the secondary right now but it smells wonderful.

People say to stick to the recipe for the first time around but for me, I'm kinda experimenting with dry hopping right now. It's relatively new to me and I love it so...

The times I've reduced aroma additions and dry hopped instead have been disappointing. You can always buy more hops.

Thanks for the help. I think that I will buy and extra 1oz. of cascades to dry hop.

I just did a double batch of pale. One half was in primary for three weeks, the other went to secondary after two weeks with two onces of Cascades for 11 days (I hope that was long enough?) I just bottled the dry hoped half yesterday. I can't wait to taste and compare the two.

I don't think you can really clone SAPA without dry hoping.

I wanted to speak to the idea of changing brew kits. I brewed my first couple kits "as is". But after that I had built a MLT and started doing partial mash brews with kits. Meaning I'd order a scottish 80 plus 3 lbs of Marris Otter to mash with the specialty grains. Sometimes I'd do that plus perform late boil extract additions which means I'd have to modify my hop schedule. Forget about what the kits say do, do your own thing, just be sure to do the research so you know what/why you're doing it. Experimentation makes for a better brewer.

Schlante,
Phillip

I learned to do plenty research after I brewed my first beer. Heard and tried to do a late axtract addition but did not realize that the hop schedule would need to be changed. Beer turned out ok but the bittering hops overpowered the aroma hops. Now I know. Going to try doing a late extract addition tomorrow but this time will adjust the hop schedule.

Sierra Nevada is definitely dry hopped, If you you don't want to buy another oz of cascade i would rob it from the the finishing hop addition and use it to dry hop

If available where you are buy some "Hazed and Infused" made by Boulder Beer Co. It is dry hopped and the most delicious beer ever.

Brewed the beer today and after advice from friend who has been brewing a lot longer than me I changed the recipe up some. Recipe called for 2 oz. of perle for 60 min and 2 oz. cascade for 5 min. Changed to 1 0z perle and 1 oz casacade for 60 min and 5 min. The I will dry hop with an additional 1 oz. of cascade. Might not be like SNPA but I was more less just shooting for that style. I will let you know how it works.

Sounds like a good approach. I've found that smaller quantities of multiple hops produce much better results than massive amounts of one. My best IPA to date was the 3CPA: Columbus & chinook for bittering, then a blend of Cascades, Perle and Amarillo for flavor, aroma and dry hopping. Used an ounce of each.

I think your right on with one once. I just tried my first APA with the two onces of cascade dry-hop and I think it's more than SNPA uses.

I'm surprised how much it effects everything--bitterness, flavor and aroma.

flyingyahoo said:

Brewed the beer today and after advice from friend who has been brewing a lot longer than me I changed the recipe up some. Recipe called for 2 oz. of perle for 60 min and 2 oz. cascade for 5 min. Changed to 1 0z perle and 1 oz casacade for 60 min and 5 min. The I will dry hop with an additional 1 oz. of cascade. Might not be like SNPA but I was more less just shooting for that style. I will let you know how it works.

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I brewed the same kit from Midwest and just started drinking it this week. I backed off the Perle to 1 oz based on a recommedation from Midwest (I called them with a question). I did late extract add and used 1 oz of Cascade at 5 mins and the other at flameout. The beer is plenty bitter enough with just the 1 oz of Perle, but the hop aroma is not what I wanted. I think you are wise to dry hop with an additional oz of Cascade. I will do that if I brew this kit again (which I probably will because it's very tasty).