Watery IPA

I did a modified Brewers Best IPA kit, added 2 oz. of extra hops. I did 2 weeks primary, and 2 weeks secondray and it's been in the bottle for about 3-3 1/2 weeks now. I had one last night and its still nice and hoppy, but seems more watery then it did about 1 1/2 weeks ago... Anybody ever experiance this? It also happened with my first batch of BB IPA, I let one age for about 1 1/2 month oin the bottle and it was really watery. Day by day the seem to get worse.


HELP!!!!!!!!

And just to add, it was AWESOME after 10 days in the bottle.

dirtymike1 said:

And just to add, it was AWESOME after 10 days in the bottle.

Click to expand...

Then you should have drank it then!!!

Sorry to hear that, that boggles my mind. I don't even know what could cause that.

only thing i can think of is that the hops are fading and you don't have enough malt to back things up.

You think thre fading that fast though?!? I didn't add more malt to th 2nd batch, I was going for a more hoppy brew, but even the first one did it. I'm stumped. I know its not light exposer or anything like that. They've stayed in a cooler off in the corner until they go in the fridge. I'm trying to make a nice, hearty beer that can stand some good time aging.

I almost positve its not, as there are no signs, but an infection/souring of some kind? There's been none of the tell tale signs....It's just "watery"

Can you give a recipe or list of ingredients?

6.6 lbs. Plain Light Malt Extract
1 lb. Crushed Crystal Malt
8 oz. Crushed Victory
2 oz. Cascade Hops (Bittering)
1 oz. Cascade Hops (Finishing)
5 oz. Priming Sugar
1 each Beer Yeast

I also added an extra 2 oz Cascade (cont hopping) during the hour boil
And 1 oz Centenial for dry hopping

I followed the directions for the Brewer's Best kit I bought just added more hops

Could it be the water in my apartment? It's filtered in the building, I don't filter it myself at the facset though. The quality is pretty good, no off taste or smell to the water when I drink it.

hmm. looks like a pretty solid recipe. with all that crystal it shouldn't be watery. strange.

I've got nothing....

Just uneducated opinion but I would make an IPA with something more like 8-9 lbs LME. I think IPA is supposed to be a relatively heavy beer (I know Harpoons can give you a bad case of the me-no-remembers). I agree that hop flavor is fading and 6.6 lbs is not enough to back it up.

I made a Sam Adams clone that tasted OK after three weeks in the bottle, but some of the bottles tasted watery. I couldn't figure it out, but I think it was just because the beer was young - after another three weeks it tasted great. So my guess is your beer needs a little bit longer, and if you give it another couple of weeks you should be good to go.

Well last night I was over my Mom's house helping her pack up to move to Ca. I found bottle of my first batch that I brewed back in January. So I chill it and tried it....God awful....tasted like cold gnats piss. I think I'll up the amount of malt in my next batch, I'm really starting to think that is the problem.

I don't know if you're using liquid or dry malt extract, but when I make my house IPA I go with 7 lbs of dry. You added a lot of hops there so 6.6 probably wasn't enough.

You may want to try adding about 5 to 8 oz. of carapils to your steeping grains. Helps out with a bit more mouthfeel and foam/head retention. Your beer probably isn't "watery", but maybe just lacking some mouthfeel... is it at all undercarbed for some reason?

I use liquid malt. It's a kit, and I've heard other people say good things about them. How would you define mouthfeel? I only heard of it maybe a day or 2 ago, would you say its the texture/complexity of the beer?

This was the first BB kit I made when I started brewing 14 months ago. It turned out very well. What is your boil size? I'm doing a 3 gal myself topping off to 5. How much did you get at bottling/kegging. I was about 1/3 of a gal short of what I was aiming for at bottling so maybe mine was a bit more concentrated? Mouthfeel? Maybe think of it like this, compare mashed potatoes made from a box (instant) to those made from actual potatoes. Completely different "feel" on the palate. Does that make sense?

Yea that make sense. As for the boil, I do 3 gallons also, and top to 5. And at bottling I would say that I loss about 1/4 - 1/3 of a gallon, but I also lost some when I transferd to the secondary. I would say I was at a little under 4.5 gallons when I bottled.

I used Brewer's Best IPA as my first batch of beer and it turned out very nice. Maybe you did something procedurally wrong? My batch was actually very flavorful.

That amount of LME puts this on the lower end of the IPA spectrum. Try this kit again with eight oz. of cara-pils (as mentioned) steeped and one or two lbs. of light DME. You can also try my recipe for an easy IPA. I'm drinking one as I type and bought ingredients for a second batch today.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=68017

think you were a little light on fermentables as everyone before has said. here is my extract recipe for 5 gall. batch
8lbs pale LME
1/2 lb carapils
1/2 lb victory
1/4 lb honey malt
WLP 051

1/2 oz horizon at 60
1/2 oz horizon at 20
1 oz simcoe at 15
1 oz columbus at 5
1 oz of simcoe dry
fermented 2 weeks at 60 degrees

I just love the late addition hops.