My First IPA---Please Critique

60 minute boil
5 gallon boil
5 gallon batch
14 day primary
14 day bottling
67.1 IBU's

6.5 pounds Amber LME
1 pound Crystal Malt 40L
.5 pound Cara-Pils
1 teaspoon Irish Moss

Hops:
1 ounce New Zealand Cascade (8.2%) 60 minutes
1 ounce US Cascade (4.0%) 30 minutes
.5 ounce whole leaf Cascade (6.0%) 20 minutes
.5 ounce whole leaf Cascade (6.0%) 15 minutes
.5 ounce whole leaf Cascade (6.0%) 10 minutes
.5 ounce whole leaf Cascade (6.0%) dry hop for 14 days in primary

Looks like a great recipe. You will appreciate the fact that you kept it relatively simple, with only cascade hops, sdo you can really get a feel for the flavors you get from your ingredients, it will help on future recipes.

One problem I made on my first IPA was going WAY overboard, and basically making a hop bomb. Well over 100IBUs on BeerSmith with like 5 different kinds of hops. It came out good, but I had no idea why, or what I was tasting.

My only critique would be to use light or pale extract, and perhaps think about dry instead of liquid. In all of my extract batches, I think the flavor I got from dry was far superior to liquid. The reason for light extract, is darker extracts use specialty grains and other dark grains that may not neccesarilly be right for your style of beer, and pale extract will only be pale or 2-row malt. You get your color from adding adding your crystal and other specialty malts.

What do you mean by 14 days bottling?

I meant 14 days of carbing in the bottle before i can't help but open it up.

Right on.

Go for 30

Hey Mule. I'm wondering about that chocolate rasberry stout in your signature. Do you mind sharing the recipe? I have a chocolate cherry stout in my primary right now and i ran into a problem of it creating it's own heat and now it tastes like someone dumped some isopropinal alcohol in there for me. I think we can just let it sit on the yeast cake for about a month to take care of this. Anyway, i just want to compare recipes to see where I may have gone wrong. Thanks. You can pm if you want so this thread doesn't get off topic. thanks
Bobby

OK. So after more reseach and ilkestuff's suggestion here's what I have come up with.

Sunshine IPA
60 minute boil time
5 gallon boil
5 gallon batch
14 day primary
14 day carbination

• 6 pounds Light DME
• 1 pound Crystal Malt 40L
• .5 pound Cara-Pils
• 1 teaspoon Irish Moss
• 1 ounce Organic New Zealand Cascade (60 minute)
• 1 ounce Cascade from Joe (30 minute)
• .5 ounce Domestic Cascade Raw Leaf (20 minute)
• .5 ounce Domestic Cascade Raw Leaf (15 minute)
• .5 ounce Domestic Cascade Raw Leaf (10 minute)
• .5 ounce Domestic Cascade Raw Leaf (Dry Hop: 14 days)

IBU’s = 67.1

Well, that looks pretty good to me- except I'd use less crystal. Maybe 1/2 pound. I like the hopping- but I had a question about the dry hops. You're going to leave the beer in the primary, and dry hop once it's finished fermenting?

Bobby1579 said:

Hey Mule. I'm wondering about that chocolate rasberry stout in your signature. Do you mind sharing the recipe? I have a chocolate cherry stout in my primary right now and i ran into a problem of it creating it's own heat and now it tastes like someone dumped some isopropinal alcohol in there for me. I think we can just let it sit on the yeast cake for about a month to take care of this. Anyway, i just want to compare recipes to see where I may have gone wrong. Thanks. You can pm if you want so this thread doesn't get off topic. thanks
Bobby

Click to expand...

Bobby, PM sent.

just fwiw.. but a 5 gallon boil will yield around a 4 gallon batch in the end, maybe a tad less after samples, trub loss, etc.

YooperBrew said:

I like the hopping- but I had a question about the dry hops. You're going to leave the beer in the primary, and dry hop once it's finished fermenting?

Click to expand...

I have an IPA in primary that I dry hopped in primary during fermentation. I dropped them in between removing my blow-out tube and putting the fermentation lock on. My LHBS guy told me this was the proper time to dry hop. Was that info inaccurate?

HOOTER said:

I have an IPA in primary that I dry hopped in primary during fermentation. I dropped them in between removing my blow-out tube and putting the fermentation lock on. My LHBS guy told me this was the proper time to dry hop. Was that info inaccurate?

Click to expand...

I heard Jamil Z. interviewing a guy that starts his dry hopping when his airlock slows to 15 second intervals. He stated that the CO2 being released from fermentation would force out any oxygen introduced from the hop bag.

Works for him I guess

ok so due to much advice giving I will now be using 8 oz. of crystal, dry hopping in the secondary, and starting with a 6.5 gallon boil. Thanks everyone.