Help with basic Imperial IPA

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KAMMEE

KAMMEE

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I'm not a fan of IPA's but I'm coming around and am definitely able to appreciate them more since I started home brewing but need some help with an Imperial IPA recipe that I want to make for SWMBO's brother, who loves IPA's. Here's what I have so far, so critique away, as I'm trying to learn about variations on the style.

Grains

0.5 lb carapils
0.5 lb Crystal 40L

Malt Extract
9.15 lb Northern Brewer's Golden LME
1 LB Golden DME

Hops:
2 oz. Chinook Hops pellets 90 minutes
1 oz. Cascade Hops pellets 50 minutes
0.5 oz. Cascade Hops Pellets 2 minutes (aroma)
0.5 oz. Cascade Hops Pellets (Dry Hop) 7 days in secondary

Wyeast PacMan Ale Yeast - with a starter
 
Hmmmmm....... you say you aren't a big fan of IPA's. Are you sure you want to start with a 100ish IBU imperial? Sounds bitter as heck lol and looks to be about 100ish IBUs at your current hop schedule.

My experience with Chinook is that it tends to provide a pretty harsh bitterness. I have never used it as a 90 minute addition (only as a 60 and some spread throughout the rest of the boil). My initial reaction seeing the 2.0 oz at 90 minutes tells me it will be pretty harsh. If you want to keep it at "imperial level" (100 IBU's) I would add less at 90 and increase your additions throughout the boil and bump up the late additions A LOT. I don't think .5 oz of cascade at 2 minutes + .5 oz dry will give you the aroma your looking for in an imperial. (this increases cost significantly unless you have bulk hops).

I'd consider maybe knocking it down to 65-75 IBU's. That should provide you with plenty of bitterness for the gravity you are at. Especially if you're not a huge fan of IPA's

Check out some of the other imperial recipes in the recipe section for some inspiration.
 
You are going to want more late hopping than that. I would adjust the 90 minaddition to have the same level of bittering as you have it right now with the 90 and 50. That might mean closer to 2.5 oz of chinook at 90. Then go at least an ounce of hops at 10 minutes. Another at 0 minutes, plus at least 1 oz of dry hop.

Double IPAs are all about the hop lavor and aroma, and you can't be shy about putting the hops in. If I was going my way and had more hops, I'd go something more like this. And you don't have to use just cascade in the late hops. I'd use any combination of Cascade, Centennial, Columbus, Simcoe, Amarillo or Chinook.

90 min bittering addition
1.5 oz 15 min
1.5 oz 10 min
1.5 oz 5 min
1.5 oz 0 min
2.0 oz dry hop

It might look like a ton of hops, but that's the only way you can get that flavor and aroma. I've seen recipes that go closer to a pound of hops for a standard 5 gallons.
 
Id try some Summit hops.Few months back i made a IIPA and used all summit hops(5 ozs),pretty tasty imo
 
This is the type of feedback I was looking for. Like I said, I'm not a huge fan of IPA's and really don't have experience with the style, but I'm brewing this for my Brother in Law. I'm going to adjust the hop schedule as follows.

1 oz chinook 90 min
1 oz centennial 60 min
1 oz cascade 30 min
0.5 oz cascade 15 min
0.5 oz cascade 2 min
1 oz cascade for a 7 day dry hop.

I calculate this at approximately 68-70 IBU's depending on the potency of the hops. Does this look better?
 
Also, I assume the rest of the recipe looks alright, considering the only objections I've seen relate to the hop schedule?
 
Maybe I'll just move the cascade additions up to 10, 5, and 2, with a full ounce at each
 
mixmasterob said:
Could you share the recipe?
Click to expand...

Sure,Extract recipe though.6 gallon recipe with starter


% LB OZ Malt or Fermentable ppg °L

92% 11 0 Light/Pale Malt Extract Syrup info 36 5
8% 1 0 Corn Syrup info 36 1


Batch size: 6.0 gallons

Original Gravity
1.072
(1.064 to 1.075)
Final Gravity
1.018
(1.016 to 1.019)
Color
7° SRM / 14° EBC
(Gold to Copper)

hops
use time oz variety form aa

boil 60 mins 1.0 Summit info pellet 18.5
boil 15 mins 2.0 Summit info pellet 18.5
boil 5 mins 0.5 Summit info pellet 18.5
boil 1 min 1.0 Summit info pellet 18.5
dry hop 7 days 0.5 Summit info pellet 18.5
add icon
Boil: 3.5 avg gallons for 60 minutes


Bitterness
64.4 IBU / 19 HBU
updating...
cancel
ƒ: Tinseth edit
BU:GU
0.89

yeast

White Labs Dry English Ale (WLP007)


Alcohol
7.2% ABV / 6% ABW
Calories
237 per 12 oz.

boil 15 min 1 ounces Irish Moss
 
Just thought I'd chime in here that IIPAs are all about finishing hops. I recently brewed an American IPA. It's not quite big enough to be classified as an IIPA, and it's all-grain, so that part of the recipe won't be of any use to you. But here's my hopping schedule:
1oz Amarillo in the mash tun (you could get similar results by tossing them in with your steeping grains).
1oz Chinook for 60min.
1.5oz Cascade for 15min.
1.5oz Cascade for 5min.
1oz Amarillo and 1oz Cascade dry hopped.

It works out to 60IBUs for a beer with an OG of 1.064 (Ray Daniels suggests having approximately equal IBUs to gravity units for IPAs). I can't give you definite feedback on it since it's still bottle conditioning, but at bottling time it tasted fantastic even without carbing or chilling! If your IIPA is to style (OG somewhere around 1.090+), you're probably going to want 10+ oz of hops with about 75% of them either dry hopped or boiled for no more than 15 minutes.
 
One other suggestion: I'd recommend using 0.5-1 lb of either table or corn sugar. It will help dry this out a bit and bring the FG down closer to 1.010. The general idea with IIPAs is to have an insanely hoppy-flavored beer that is still very drinkable. A more malty finish will push your beer more towards the barleywine style.
 
shuf said:
The recipe looks good, but you might want to write out your procedure. For example, what steps are you following for the PacMan starter?

The starter is pretty basic, and there are lots of other threads on that but I use six ounces of light DME boiled in two cups water then let it cool to room temp with the lid on the pot. I'll smack the activator pack three hours before pitching into a sanitized mason jar with the wort, put some sanitized foil on the top of the mason jar and leave it on my counter overnight and pitch it in the fermenter with my wort the next day at around 72 degrees.

As for the procedure, its pretty standard as well. Steep grains 30 min, Bring to boil, add LME, Add hops according to the schedule, add DME during final 10 Min, chill, strain into fermenter with 2 gallons of water, top off to make five gallons. Take hydrometer reading, put airlock on and forget about it for ten days before checking gravity and then moving to secondary for a week before bottling.
Click to expand...
 
I finalized my recipe, cut it down to three gallons as my Brother in Law only wants a case, and three gallons should give me close to a case for him and a sixer for me to keep.

0.25 lb Carapils 1.5L
0.5 lb Belgian Caravienne 20L
6 lb Golden LME (northern brewer)
0.5 lb Glolden DME
Hop Schedule:
1 Oz Chinook 60 Min 13AA, 55 IBU
0.5 Oz Centennial 15 Min 10AA, 10 IBU
0.5 Oz Cascade 10 Min 6AA, 5 IBU
0.5 Oz Centennial 5 Min 10 AA, 4 IBU
0.5 Oz Cascade 2 Min 6AA, 1 IBU
1 Oz Cascade Dry Hop in Secondary for 7 Days
1 Oz Steamed Oak Chips in Secondary for 7 Days

75 IBU's
OG estimated 1.085
FG estimated 1.019
For 8.7% ABV
8.4 Lovibond
 
Two comments:
First, on your starter, you said:
The starter is pretty basic, and there are lots of other threads on that but I use six ounces of light DME boiled in two cups water then let it cool to room temp with the lid on the pot.
Click to expand...
That should be 6oz of DME in 2qts of water.

Your recipe looks decent, though your FG is on the high side for the style. I might replace the 0.5lb DME with 0.5lb corn sugar. It's a bit more fermentable and will dry it out a bit more. Either way it should be pretty good.
 
I'm not sure about the pictorial instructions (certainly the airlock is not recommended), but here's what mrmalty says about starters:
When making starter wort, make sure you keep the OG around 1.030 to 1.040. You do not want to make a high gravity starter to grow yeast. As a ballpark measurement, use about 6 ounces (by weight) of DME to 2 quarts of water. If you're working in metric, it couldn't be easier. Use a 10 to 1 ratio. Add 1 gram of DME for every 10 ml of final volume. (If you're making a 2 liter of starter add 200 grams of DME to the flask, then fill the flask with water until you have 2 liters total.)
Click to expand...

If you're diluting your boiled solution back down to a 2qt-2L solution before pitching you should be fine. Just make sure your starter gravity isn't way too high!
 
I just bottled this today, got a full case out of it when I thought I'd get a case plus six. Oh well. I tasted my hydrometer sample and it is really good. This turned out great with an OG of 1.088 and an FG of 1.017. The oak chips give it a very distinct flavor in addition to the hops. Now to wait a month for bottle conditioning.
 
This still needs some time to carb up... probably a couple months cause its been almost a month in the bottle and its pretty flat, only a little hiss when I open it up and no bubbles. I have read that some higher gravity beers take a while to carb so I'll let this one rest for a while.
 

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