IPA is kind of malty

I brewed an IPA a little over a month ago and I kegged it and force carbed it and tried it but it tastes a bit too malty. The FG was 1.019, is that a bit too high? I racked it to a secondary after two weeks and I didnt see any action in the airlock after that. I'm getting the same sort of malty taste that I got with my octoberfest I brewed a few months ago. Could temperature be a factor in it? After two weeks of fermenting the heat went on in my house and the beer went from low 60s to high 60s

EDIT:

I now have a similar problem with my second IPA. Rather than spamming the boards with another similar topic I'm just gonna add it here. I brewed a second IPA over a month ago and I drank it a few nights ago and it doesn't taste bad but it should taste a lot more hoppier. It tastes more like a really pale ale (although the color is kinda dark). I have two theories I'm going with. One is that I used these new muslin hop bags. They didn't seem very permeable to me but I said "hey screw it" and tried them anyway. Maybe they didn't let enough of the oils get through the bags? I'll post pictures of the bags later and probably a video of water draining through the bags so you guys can get an idea of how permeable they are. My second theory is goes like this. I bought all the ingredients for two batches of beer. This IPA was the second batch. I didnt think to freeze the hops or anything since they were in a vacuum sealed bag. When I opened up the hops two weeks later when I was going to brew this batch everything seemed fine, they smell great and everything. I don't really buy this theory but I figured I would mention it anyway. My only plan to fix this is to maybe get some more hops from the store and dry hop the beer. However the beer is already in the keg and carbonated. Would this be a problem? Here is my recipe that I used. I got it off the forums somewhere, I just can't remember.

1lb Crystal 40
1/2 lb Munich
8lbs LME

2oz Northern Brewer (60min)
1oz Willamette (30min)
1oz Cascade (30min)
1oz Cascade (5min)
1/2 tablet Whirlfloc (5min)

Yeast: White Labs WLP001

OG: 1.055
FG:1.016

jhorgan1 said:

I brewed an IPA a little over a month ago and I kegged it and force carbed it and tried it but it tastes a bit too malty. The FG was 1.019, is that a bit too high? I racked it to a secondary after two weeks and I didnt see any action in the airlock after that. I'm getting the same sort of malty taste that I got with my octoberfest I brewed a few months ago. Could temperature be a factor in it? After two weeks of fermenting the heat went on in my house and the beer went from low 60s to high 60s

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It's probably recipe related, rather than temperature related. Not only grain, but yeast strain as well play a part in the perception of "malty" or "hoppy". What is your recipe? If you used a lot of crystal malts, a "malty" malt like Munich malt, and/or underhopped a bit, that would increase the maltiness of the beer.

Yooper said:

It's probably recipe related, rather than temperature related. Not only grain, but yeast strain as well play a part in the perception of "malty" or "hoppy". What is your recipe? If you used a lot of crystal malts, a "malty" malt like Munich malt, and/or underhopped a bit, that would increase the maltiness of the beer.

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I'm with yooper. Additionally, one temp that could impact the "maltiness" would be your mash temp, if you did all grain. if you were brewing with extract, then never mind.

I don't have the recipe notes on hand but it was extract. I think it was 8lbs of LME, some Crystal 15 although I dont remember how much. 1.5 oz of Magnum at 60, and 2 oz of Cascade at 30 and 1. The only thing is that when I did the hops I accidently put the cascade in at 60 not the magnum. I realized that mistake after a few minutes and took the cascade out put in the magnum (i put the hops in bags) If anything I think that would make it more hoppy. I used dry yeast too, idk if that helps. I'll get the exact recipe in a few days. I didnt think it had something to do with the recipe because it was a kit that I got from morebeer

jhorgan1 said:

I don't have the recipe notes on hand but it was extract. I think it was 8lbs of LME, some Crystal 15 although I dont remember how much. 1.5 oz of Magnum at 60, and 2 oz of Cascade at 30 and 1. The only thing is that when I did the hops I accidently put the cascade in at 60 not the magnum. I realized that mistake after a few minutes and took the cascade out put in the magnum (i put the hops in bags) If anything I think that would make it more hoppy. I used dry yeast too, idk if that helps. I'll get the exact recipe in a few days. I didnt think it had something to do with the recipe because it was a kit that I got from morebeer

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Ha, when I was reading that you swapped the magnum and the cascade, i started thinking "well there's your problem", since magnum is a lot higher AA than cascade and you'd end up with a lot less bitterness with that swap.

You could have ended up with less hop aroma/flavor from the fact that you dunked the cascade for a bit at the beginning, any flavor or aroma compounds that dissolved into the wort at that point were a lost cause.

Maybe the kit is just a maltier recipe than you'd prefer for your IPAs.

Oh, how and when did you add your LME? Was it off the heat source when you added the LME? Stirred well? If you caramelized some LME, that could lead to a sweeter finished product than intended.

Think it's pretty obvious. Your late hops were 'pre-boiled', removed, sat wet, hot and bagged, and then added late?! They probably didn't have to many flavor/aroma compounds at that point.

discnjh said:

Oh, how and when did you add your LME? Was it off the heat source when you added the LME? Stirred well? If you caramelized some LME, that could lead to a sweeter finished product than intended.

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+1 to the above advice, plus the age of the extract may play a role in higher FGs (increased concentration of unfermentables). I've had 2/5 extract kits finish at 1.018-1.020. If you search on the site, you'll see that it's not that uncommon for extract beers to sometimes finish a little high...Good luck!

I turned off the heat and stirred it in. I do a 3 gal boil so maybe its possible I didnt stir enough and some of it caramelized. I will definitely make sure to do a better job next time. I hope it wasnt old malt extract. morebeer has a whole page ranting about how they have the freshest malt extract available.
I have another IPA that will be ready on the 3rd and this one i used liquid yeast and I made sure I didnt mess up the hop schedule so hopefully that one will really be the IPA that I want

jhorgan1 said:

I turned off the heat and stirred it in. I do a 3 gal boil so maybe its possible I didnt stir enough and some of it caramelized. I will definitely make sure to do a better job next time. I hope it wasnt old malt extract. morebeer has a whole page ranting about how they have the freshest malt extract available.
I have another IPA that will be ready on the 3rd and this one i used liquid yeast and I made sure I didnt mess up the hop schedule so hopefully that one will really be the IPA that I want

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You can do a couple of things to make the beer less "extracty" and more like a commercial IPA. One is really simple- add the bulk of the fermentables (particularly LME) at the end of the boil instead of at the beginning. It'll light up the color, make the beer less "extract-y" (less maillard reactions), increase the hops flavor, and so on. We can help walk you through doing that when you're ready!

jhorgan1 said:

I turned off the heat and stirred it in. I do a 3 gal boil so maybe its possible I didnt stir enough and some of it caramelized. I will definitely make sure to do a better job next time. I hope it wasnt old malt extract. morebeer has a whole page ranting about how they have the freshest malt extract available.
I have another IPA that will be ready on the 3rd and this one i used liquid yeast and I made sure I didnt mess up the hop schedule so hopefully that one will really be the IPA that I want

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I really don't think your issue is with when or how you added extract. You yourself stated your error with hopping your wort. That error most likely resulted in your flavor/aroma hops already being spent when you re-added them after mistakenly boiling them. Flavor and aroma compounds boil off in just a few minutes, so the hops you re-added most likely didn't have any of those compounds left. Basically, you didn't do enough (if any) late hopping, resulting in a maltier beer.

NordeastBrewer77 said:

Think it's pretty obvious. Your late hops were 'pre-boiled', removed, sat wet, hot and bagged, and then added late?! They probably didn't have to many flavor/aroma compounds at that point.

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I really think this ^ is the correct answer to your question about your IPA being too malty.

Just don't call it an IPA. Problem solved.



You are Welcome.

I only used the pre-boiled hops for flavoring. the aroma hops went in no problem. I actually shared the beer with my family tonight and it tasted a lot better (hoppier) than when i had tried it a few nights earlier. it made my parents and siblings wince at the bitterness so i guess thats a good sign maybe im just used to super hopped beers like Ruination. it still had a malty undertone which me and my friend identified but it actually may have helped to improve the beer. Regardless, I think I'm going to go with Yoopers suggestion for adding half the LME at the end of the boil since it did seem a bit too dark for an IPA, at least way darker than the picture on the website where I got the kit. Thanks for everyones suggestions!

That Hop bill looks more fitting for a pale ale than an IPA.

My house pale has magnum for bittering and 3 oz cascade flameout hops and 2 oz cascade dry hop. It peaks for 2 weeks before fading hard for weeks 3-4, then stabilizing as a soft pale with orange flavor.

I think your recipe just doesn't have enough hops.

Did you let it condition? IPA's should be drank ASAP to get the freshest hop character.

well its been almost 5 weeks since i boiled this batch. it tasted really malty when at 4 weeks then last night it tasted a lot more like an IPA. go figure. maybe I'll try dry hopping next batch.

Are you sure the fermentation was complete? You indicated that you didn't see any activity in the airlock, but that really doesn't mean anything. 1.019 is a little high for an IPA. You need to take readings on consecutive days to verify the gravity isn't still dropping.

I now have a similar problem with my second IPA. Rather than spamming the boards with another similar topic I'm just gonna add it here. I brewed a second IPA over a month ago and I drank it a few nights ago and it doesn't taste bad but it should taste a lot more hoppier. It tastes more like a really pale ale (although the color is kinda dark). I have two theories I'm going with. One is that I used these new muslin hop bags. They didn't seem very permeable to me but I said "hey screw it" and tried them anyway. Maybe they didn't let enough of the oils get through the bags? I'll post pictures of the bags later and probably a video of water draining through the bags so you guys can get an idea of how permeable they are. My second theory is goes like this. I bought all the ingredients for two batches of beer. This IPA was the second batch. I didnt think to freeze the hops or anything since they were in a vacuum sealed bag. When I opened up the hops two weeks later when I was going to brew this batch everything seemed fine, they smell great and everything. I don't really buy this theory but I figured I would mention it anyway. My only plan to fix this is to maybe get some more hops from the store and dry hop the beer. However the beer is already in the keg and carbonated. Would this be a problem? Here is my recipe that I used. I got it off the forums somewhere, I just can't remember.

1lb Crystal 40
1/2 lb Munich
8lbs LME

2oz Northern Brewer (60min)
1oz Willamette (30min)
1oz Cascade (30min)
1oz Cascade (5min)
1/2 tablet Whirlfloc (5min)

Yeast: White Labs WLP001

OG: 1.055
FG:1.016

The reason the beer isn't "hoppy" could be partly because of the hops bags, but also the recipe isn't "hoppy".

Hops generally are at added at different times for different reasons. That's because they have oils in them that must boil to "isomerize" to create the bitterness. That usually is most effective at about 60 minutes. So that explains the 60 minute hops- they are bittering hops.

Hops added later don't have enough time to get the full bitterness out of them, so they are used for flavor additions. Flavor additions are 20-15 minutes and they give little bitterness, although they do give some.

Aroma hops give a bit of flavor but more aroma and very little bitterness. Those are usually added at the end of the boil, from 5-0 minutes.

Because of this, a traditional hops schedule is:

60 minutes
15 minutes
5 minutes

Most hoppy beers are all about the flavor and aroma- those are the additions from 20 minutes to the end of the boil. You can see from your recipe that you had only 1 addition that would be in this category, so that is why the beer doesn't have much hops flavor and aroma.

The hops added at 30 minutes give some bitterness, but much of the flavor is gone. So they really didn't "do" anything for you, if that makes sense. I use 30 minute hops only when I need a bit more bitterness but don't want to add 1/4 ounce of hops extra at 60 minutes to get the IBUs out of them. The same recipe, making a hoppier beer would be:

2oz Northern Brewer (60min) (bittering)
1oz Cascade (15 min) (flavor)
1oz Willamette (10 min) (flavor and aroma)
1oz Cascade (5min) (mostly aroma and some flavor)

Okay thanks. That makes sense. I'm going to try to rebrew this using your suggestion using the hop bags again to see if it's the recipe or the bags.

Did i miss something or did someone already point out the fact that he bittered with cascades instead of magnum,reducing the ibu's-a lot? So then it would be more malty. Part of the reason can be your water also,like if it has more cl2, then it accentuates more malt flavor.
Im in favor of not using extract for stronger beers also, from my experience it seems they are way to malty and finish higer than i want.Maybe if you had harder water it would have turned out less malty also - but thats just a guess since its extract.

Brewing 3 gallons partial boil and using extract is going to create malty, sweet beers...most likely with strong caramel flavors.

Your hop utilization will be much lower because of the concentrated wort gravity and smaller boil volume. I would double your hop schedule. I would also dry hop.

All of my extract beers came out much more malty, caramelly, and far less hoppy than I was hoping for...which made them very accessible and drinkable to my friends but disappointing to me.

So for future brews: Either do a full boil or double your boil hops and add a dry hop of 3 oz. Maybe cut the C40 in half too.

Also, I see you're steeping Munich. That should be mashed, so if you're steeping it, let it work for 30 minutes at least. Maybe find some CaraMunich instead.

jonmohno said:

Did i miss something or did someone already point out the fact that he bittered with cascades instead of magnum,reducing the ibu's-a lot? So then it would be more malty. Part of the reason can be your water also,like if it has more cl2, then it accentuates more malt flavor.
Im in favor of not using extract for stronger beers also, from my experience it seems they are way to malty and finish higer than i want.Maybe if you had harder water it would have turned out less malty also - but thats just a guess since its extract.

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Yes, you missed something. We covered batch 1, and are now discussing batch #2, the recipe of which is posted immediately above my post.

All good points being offered here so far. I'd add a recommendation to dry hop for sure. IMO, you can't have an IPA without dry hopping. 2oz is about right.

Also, if you get your FG lower both the bitterness and hop flavor is going to pop that much more. Consider replacing 10% of your LME with table sugar and add it to the boil when you add the LME. My best IPAs have all been under 1.015.

2bluewagons said:

All good points being offered here so far. I'd add a recommendation to dry hop for sure. IMO, you can't have an IPA without dry hopping. 2oz is about right.

Also, if you get your FG lower both the bitterness and hop flavor is going to pop that much more. Consider replacing 10% of your LME with table sugar and add it to the boil when you add the LME. My best IPAs have all been under 1.015.

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I wouldn't add table sugar -- I'd reduce the crystal malt and increase either the Munich or the LME. That will create a more fermentable wort, lighten the color, but still maintain some balance. While an IPA is supposed to be hoppy, it still needs to be balanced.

As a rule of thumb, adding table sugar, IMO, is rarely a good idea.

That's somewhat of an old myth. As long as the sucrose isn't over 20-30% of the fermentables, he should be fine. If worried, use dextrose.

These should be in simple syrup form.

GlenF said:

That's somewhat of an old myth. As long as the sucrose isn't over 20-30% of the fermentables, he should be fine. If worried, use dextrose.

These should be in simple syrup form.

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It may be a myth, but I just never saw much value to adding something to my beer that doesn't impact the flavor. I like beers with lots of balance, so I'd rather make a more fermentable beer by using the correct grains and mash techniques.

Just my personal opinion.

hercher said:

It may be a myth, but I just never saw much value to adding something to my beer that doesn't impact the flavor. I like beers with lots of balance, so I'd rather make a more fermentable beer by using the correct grains and mash techniques.

Just my personal opinion.

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It all depends on what you're going for. On big beers that you want to finish with a low gravity (such as Pliny the Elder), low mash temps PLUS sugar helps get you there.

Whenever I steep specialty grains I always let them steep for at least 25 minutes, usually 30 as long as I'm not in a rush. I'm working on getting an 8 gallon pot but I just bought a new kegging system too so I have to wait a little bit before I invest in another big purchase unless I can find a cheap pot. I'm definitely doing dryhopping next time I brew an IPA. I hear it's a major improvement. I'm probably going to have to wait a month before I attempt this recipe again since I need to start brewing all the beer I want to have ready for St. Patricks day.

I think maybe the problem with me getting sort of high FGs is because I don't make a yeast starter. I'm working on building my own yeast starter from a computer fan so hopefully making yeast starters will be a huge improvement

Okay, just got done with a very messy brew day. I decided to dry hop my beer with half an oz of Warrior and an oz of Falconers Flight. It should be noted that the keg was only 2/3 full. So I forgot to tie the bag shut and two days later when I wanted to try a pint nothing came out... ****. So today while I was brewing this IPA again with Yoopers changes I siphoned the beer from the keg to a bucket with a hop bag over the end of the autosiphon. Is it just me or are carbonated beverages harder to siphon? It took about 20 minutes to move 3 gallons. Anyway, the end result was pretty good. It didnt really bitter the beer more, it just made it have more of a hop flavor and aroma. This I expected, all things considered I am very happy with my beer although I don't think I'll be bragging about this beer to my friends. The brewing was pretty normal. The whole kitchen smelled of hops tonight so I'd say I can expect a really good hoppy IPA when its done I also reused the yeast from the IPA I fixed today. It's my first time reusing yeast so I hope I did everything right. If not I have a packet of dry yeast I can always use.

A lot going on in this thread! I ran into some of the same issues you did, received some of the same advice (thanks Yooper) and had stellar results. I also brewed in a 3 gallon pot, I switched some of my bittering hops to Warrior pellets, nice bang for you volume, and try to add the majority of my DME at the end. I also played around with large amounts of late hop additions and dry hopping. A yeast starter is also helpful to get to that desired low teens FG. That being said, the best thing I did was the late hop additions while quickly cooling my wort to keep all the goodies in, sometimes I actually cool for a bit and then add an oz. of hops (only down to like 150*) and then steep that. Dry hopping the right hops for what you want (citrus, pine, etc) can play a huge role in your outcome, remember, a ton of what you taste is determined by what you smell first! Good luck, and look into partial mashing too, with a small kettle you can make a nice improvement in your beer taste this way!