One grain, one hope beer idea--feedback please

Hey All,

I had an idea to do a beer with 1 type of grain, 1 type of hop, maybe 1 spice, etc.
I was thinking about making it a floral pale ale.

-18# of 2-row pale
-1.0 oz Ahtanum @ 60
-.5 oz Ahtanum @ 45
-.5 oz Ahtanum @ 30
-.5 oz Ahtanum @ 15
-1.0 oz Ahtanum @ 0
-1.0 oz Ahtanum Dry hop in secondary (~7 days)
Maybe a pound or two of honey at flameout?

Yeast: California Ale White Labs (#WLP001)


Kind of an odd idea, but why not,

Thoughts?

Cheers,
Saul

Not odd at all,.. Know as SMaSH beer. Single malt, and Single hop! Go for it,...

18#s? Holy schniekes! I would also consider Cascade, but that's just me. How many gallons are you making?

Do it. Its usually referred to as a SMASH beer, Single Malt Single Hop (at least that's what I call it ). Its a great way to learn the individual flavors.

Haha well I guess my newbie colours are showing. This is only my 7th all grain batch.

I was planning on making it 5.5 gallons. Perhaps I will lower the grain bill to around 15#.

Thanks for the feedback!

-Saul

Sshamash said:

Haha well I guess my newbie colours are showing. This is only my 7th all grain batch.

I was planning on making it 5.5 gallons. Perhaps I will lower the grain bill to around 15#.

Thanks for the feedback!

-Saul

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Yeah, 18#s is a little much and 15#s still seems a little excessive, but that's just this man's opinion.

In my experience, a SMaSH is more suited to a smaller (read: non-double or imperial) recipe. Making a beer upwards of 8% can produce a lot of ... well, alcohol flavor, which is why a typical IIPA will have a good balance of crystal to malt it up some. I would expect that doing a beer that size with nothing but basic 2-row will produce something that is beer, but could be fairly boring, and largely defeats the purpose of a SMaSH attempt. The basic idea is to get a feel for what both the grain and the hop bring to the table; if it's dominated entirely by booze, you won't really get this as much. And that's without adding some additional simple sugars like honey into the mix, which will only dry it out more.

If you really want to go with a beer that size, I'd suggest trying out a more interesting base malt, like Maris Otter or Vienna. That way you'll have at least a little flavor wrestling in the background.

If you're efficiency is much over 50% this will be smashed SMaSH....

TNGabe said:

If you're efficiency is much over 50% this will be smashed SMaSH....

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So a Sloppy Sloshed SMaSH? I challenge you to say that 5 times fast the next time you get drunk.

I definitely think Vienna is the way to go with this one. MO would make it more dynamic than 2 row, but it would still be pretty monotone and boozy.

Sshamash said:

Hey All,

I had an idea to do a beer with 1 type of grain, 1 type of hop,

Click to expand...

and, evidently, 1 hope.....sweet!

Lol. I did that too.

Actually I did 4 pale ales each with a different hop to see the diff.

Not exactly the same, but maybe samd idea.

For some of the reasons stated above, I wouldn't do a SMaSH beer higher than 1.050 OG and 40 IBU's. A nice pale ale spec'd beer that gives just enough hop character and aroma to understand its qualities.

It's the best way to learn what each ingredient brings to the table. Go for it!

I'd space out those hop additions a little bit - maybe a nice bittering addition at 60 and then 15, 5, and flameout additions. That'll give you lots of hop character. The 45 and 30 minute additions won't add a whole lot of flavor or aroma. Cheers!

Thanks for all the feedback everybody. I agree with just about everything, it was a bit too overwhelming. I scaled back on the grain bill to 12# of MO.

I think you make a good point on the hop addition. I will most likely do it as you say, (60, 15, 5, flameout). But do you still think I should do 1oz @ 60, .5oz @ 15, .5oz @ 5, and 1 oz @ flameout?

Sshamash said:

Thanks for all the feedback everybody. I agree with just about everything, it was a bit too overwhelming. I scaled back on the grain bill to 12# of MO.

I think you make a good point on the hop addition. I will most likely do it as you say, (60, 15, 5, flameout). But do you still think I should do 1oz @ 60, .5oz @ 15, .5oz @ 5, and 1 oz @ flameout?

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Really I'd take down a notch even further and go with around 7lbs grain. SMASH brews are about educating your palate, less so about getting drizzuck. Personally I'd switch the grain to something you use as a background grain (Munich) or something you only use as a base grain in certain brew (Maris Otter). But that's just me. 2 row is pretty...blank.

For the hop schedule you could do 1oz at 60, another at 15 and one at flameout. 3oz (only 1 at 60) and a 12# grain bill will leave you pretty malty, though that's cool if that's what you like.
Just my. 02!