IIPA: To age or not to age?

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forces

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My standard brewing practice of late has been to set aside 2 bottles after bottling. Try 1 at 2 weeks, try another at 3 weeks to see how the batch is coming along. At that point I usually let it age for about 1.5-2 months before touching it again

So I just tasted the first bottle of a batch of IIPA after 2 weeks of aging, and it tastes GREAT. I am kind of an IPA snob (aren't we all?) so I am rather picky about the malt/ hop balance. At 2 weeks, this has a pretty damn good balance between bitterness and maltiness, and in my experience, after aging big hoppy bitter IPAs, the bitterness tends to subside, leaving a sweet beer with a lot of hop aroma, and no bitterness.

At this point I am debating whether or not I should let this continue aging, or just start digging in before the bitterness spoils. I'm Looking for suggestions from the veterans here.

Batch info:
OG 1.095
FG 1.019
ABV ~9.5%
IBU 85
SRM 12
 
I always like my IPA/DIPAs fresh. I typically start drafting right after I get it off the dry hops. I've don 10 gallon batches where I have the first 5 gallons right away, while the other 5 gallons age for a bit. I've got to say that there is a significant difference between the two. While both are good for different reasons, I just get more perceived bitterness and a huge hop aroma from that first keg. I prefer that over the 2nd keg, which is a bit more mellowed out.
 
I did a IIPA, it was pretty good at first, weeks after bottling. I had a few bottles stashed away that I tried 4 months later. Wow, it was fantastic. It did not lose any hop character. Everything just blended together better I guess and it was awesome. It sucked that I only had a couple bottles left.
 
If you only plan on aging for about a month then I say go for it, a little extra conditioning would probably be good. You might not want to age a double IPA for long term but most of the ones you buy commercially are at least a couple weeks to a month old due to the time it takes the brewery to get it to distributors and then for them to get it to the stores. Hops do fade over time but a month or so shouldn't hurt...
 
Its been 12 weeks in bottle and my Black IIPA is now starting to decline - its not bad by any means, but different. The hop flavor has died slightly but the bitterness has not. Luckily I have less than a dozen left and I can brew it again.
 
I say set aside 2 12 oz bottles to try about 3 and 6 months down the road...

typically, i dont like IPA's aged (like most hopheads) and without knowing anything about your beer, i think it might be safe to say that this beer will be most enjoyable withing 2 months of bottling...

But, drinking your IPA at an aged state might help you to learn more about what specifically happens to the particular types of hops and malts you used. There are certainly some IIPAs that age well (Maharaja comes to mind...at least up to 18 months in my opinion), so i would not rule aging out completely. But, i would go into with an educational/experimental state of mind, so that you know for the next time what to/not to do.

Cheers
 
I say set aside 2 12 oz bottles to try about 3 and 6 months down the road...

typically, i dont like IPA's aged (like most hopheads) and without knowing anything about your beer, i think it might be safe to say that this beer will be most enjoyable withing 2 months of bottling...

But, drinking your IPA at an aged state might help you to learn more about what specifically happens to the particular types of hops and malts you used. There are certainly some IIPAs that age well (Maharaja comes to mind...at least up to 18 months in my opinion), so i would not rule aging out completely. But, i would go into with an educational/experimental state of mind, so that you know for the next time what to/not to do.

Cheers


Thats funny, I have a marharaja that I've been aging for abut the last 6 months, along with a few other stouts and a Mirror Mirror.

Thanks for the comments! I had a few more last night, and I noticed two things that I didn't necessarily like;
1. There was almost a hint of sourness, which I suspect is a product of drinking a very hoppy beer at such a young age.
2. Grain astringency, which I suspect is from over-steeping grains, or steeping at too high of a temp. This I am a little worried about, because As the hop character diminishes, this will become more prominent.

Based on these observations and you're comments, I will probably kill half of the batch over the next month or so, and let the other half sit around. I really don't plan on letting it condition for anymore than 3-4 months though (I'm starting to run out of space!)

Here is the recipe:


Amount Item Type % or IBU
3.00 lb Light Dry Extract (8.0 SRM) Dry Extract 21.28 %
8.00 lb Pale Liquid Extract (8.0 SRM) Extract 56.74 %
1.40 lb Caramel/Crystal Malt - 20L (20.0 SRM) Grain 9.93 %
0.50 lb Vienna Malt (3.5 SRM) Grain 3.55 %
0.20 lb Rye Malt (4.7 SRM) Grain 1.42 %
2.00 oz Chinook [13.00 %] (60 min) Hops 28.7 IBU
1.00 oz Citra [11.00 %] (Dry Hop 6 days) Hops -
1.50 oz Centennial [10.00 %] (Dry Hop 10 days) Hops -
2.00 oz Centennial [10.00 %] (15 min) Hops 11.0 IBU
2.00 oz Cascade [5.50 %] (15 min) Hops 6.0 IBU
1.00 oz Citra [11.00 %] (10 min) Hops 4.4 IBU
1.00 oz Centennial [10.00 %] (10 min) Hops 4.0 IBU
1.00 lb Honey (1.0 SRM) Sugar 7.09 %
5.00 gal Portland OR Water
2 Pkgs SafAle American Ale (DCL Yeast #US-05) Yeast-Ale



Beer Profile

Measured Original Gravity: 1.095 SG
Measured Final Gravity: 1.019 SG
Actual Alcohol by Vol: 9.71 %
Bitterness: 84.4 IBU
Est Color: 13.2 SRM Color: Color


I have to say that the honey was a nice touch. I was a little worried about how this would effect the flavor, but it paid off. I will deffinetly brew this again, but I will probably change the bittering hops to either Challenger or Magnum, increase the IBU's a little, and sub .75 oz of the dry hops with Citra. I think that the grain bill and adjucts are money though.
 
2. Grain astringency, which I suspect is from over-steeping grains, or steeping at too high of a temp. This I am a little worried about, because As the hop character diminishes, this will become more prominent.

I've had that in some beers as well, and I used to think it was because it
was for that reason, because it's in the books. But many lagers are made
with decoction mashing, and that involves boiling the mash. So if they
are getting that astringency, maybe the protein/phenol precipitation that's
supposed to happen with lagering at 32F makes it go away. If so, maybe
if you can cool some bottles that low you can see if that cures it.
Jim:mug:
 
I've had that in some beers as well, and I used to think it was because it
was for that reason, because it's in the books. But many lagers are made
with decoction mashing, and that involves boiling the mash. So if they
are getting that astringency, maybe the protein/phenol precipitation that's
supposed to happen with lagering at 32F makes it go away. If so, maybe
if you can cool some bottles that low you can see if that cures it.
Jim:mug:

I'll give it a shot. It will be a miracle if it works, because most of my beers have had this flavor (to varrying degrees) since I started using specialty grains. My guess is that the thermometer I am using (old hand-me-down meat thermometer) isn't entirely accurate.
 
I've had that in some beers as well, and I used to think it was because it
was for that reason, because it's in the books. But many lagers are made
with decoction mashing, and that involves boiling the mash. So if they
are getting that astringency, maybe the protein/phenol precipitation that's
supposed to happen with lagering at 32F makes it go away. If so, maybe
if you can cool some bottles that low you can see if that cures it.
Jim:mug:

Well, keep in mind that when performing a decoction mash, the grains are steeped for 30 to 45 minutes before boiling the grain. This decreases the PH, inhibiting the release of astringent tannins in the husks. Over-steeping is still possible if this PH decrease doesn't happen first. Decoction is a totally different process.
 
I was cleaning my garage today and came across a box of beer that I bottled back in early 2009. I just tasted an IPA that I had in the box, bottled 3/20/2009. It was much better in April 2009, I can tell you. I'll be trying some hop oil, but the admonition on bottles of Pliny (my paraphrase: "drink it today, not tomorrow") is almost certainly wise advice and applicable to most IPAs and similar beers.
 
I was cleaning my garage today and came across a box of beer that I bottled back in early 2009. I just tasted an IPA that I had in the box, bottled 3/20/2009. It was much better in April 2009, I can tell you. I'll be trying some hop oil, but the admonition on bottles of Pliny (my paraphrase: "drink it today, not tomorrow") is almost certainly wise advice and applicable to most IPAs and similar beers.

In what way was it worse? Too dry, or was it infected?
The reason I ask is I have had mixed results with old homebrew,
but a lot of people here seem to think their beers get better
with age.
Jim:mug:
 
Old beer that I've sampled gets what I would describe as a raisin-like flavor, or in some cases becomes more cidery.

I definitely prefer fresher beer.
 
Old beer that I've sampled gets what I would describe as a raisin-like flavor, or in some cases becomes more cidery.

I definitely prefer fresher beer.

That's interesting. Mine were either drier or had a stale cardboard
taste. I tasted a cidery two year old SA Boston Ale not too long
ago.
Jim:mug:
 
I brewed a midwest IIPA In June of 09 and I just had the last one and It was Awesome. I also store in my basement which is 50 to 55 degrees. I think they get better with age.

My opinion:mug:
 
I made 14 batches last year, and I saved at least 3 bottles of each. During Christmas break, I drank all of those old ones. Anything more than about 6 months old had gotten worse. My pilsners got a cardboard taste, like someone above mentioned. The IIPA was sweeter and hotter than I remember it. My rauchbier didn't have that magic that it had before (can't put my finger on that problem). The hefe's I made were even more clovey and cloying than when I originally bottled them.

High FG beers probably benefit from aging (I have 2 going on a year right now), but I like the way Michael Jackson put it (not the one-gloved androgynous dancer):

"If you see a beer, do it a favour, and drink it. Beer was not meant to age.".
 
recently I also had some stout that I had bottled in February 2009, and it was very good. It was a sweet stout, and it definitely improved with age.

YMMV.
 
At lunch today I had another bottle of beer that I bottled back in 2009 from the box I found in my garage. It was a bottle of BCS "West Coast Blaster," and it was very good. It was probably better in April and May of 2009, but I don't recall with perfect clarity.
 
I made an IPA in November. In December the hop flavor/aroma was very fresh and alive. By January the flavor is still there, just not as intense.
 
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