American IPA Hopslam Clone

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Allright.... so I just recently brewed a pretty big ipa with a lot of hops and used pellets. I ended up with a huge amount of sludge/break material. Do people just put the whole brew into the fermenter, sludge and all and hope it drops out? I got way better hop flavor and aroma with pellets versus whole. I just need to know how to deal with all the sludge and absorption issues. Especially with dry hopping 2 or 3 oz. Help?
 
Allright.... so I just recently brewed a pretty big ipa with a lot of hops and used pellets. I ended up with a huge amount of sludge/break material. Do people just put the whole brew into the fermenter, sludge and all and hope it drops out? I got way better hop flavor and aroma with pellets versus whole. I just need to know how to deal with all the sludge and absorption issues. Especially with dry hopping 2 or 3 oz. Help?

I dump most in, somewhat because of my equipment limitations, and because I'm lazy.

Read this too:

http://brulosophy.com/2014/06/02/the-great-trub-exbeeriment-results-are-in/
 
Newbie question as I have not brewed a beer this big before.

I have a 13 gal rectangular cooler MLT and I have scaled up the grain bill for 62% efficiency as I am expecting a big drop off with this much grain and I normally figure everything on 6 gal batches as I leave a lot of the trub behind. Long story short my total grain is 25lbs and I want 7 gal to start my boil. Backing into my water i will need 7 gal boil + 3.13 gal absorption + .5 gal MLT dead space = total water of 10.63 gal. What should my initial mash volume be? If I do my normal 1.25qts/lb it only leaves about 2.5 gal to sparge with. Should I just put it all in during the initial mash? What is the norm for this much grain? What will get me the best efficiency?
 
Newbie question as I have not brewed a beer this big before.

I have a 13 gal rectangular cooler MLT and I have scaled up the grain bill for 62% efficiency as I am expecting a big drop off with this much grain and I normally figure everything on 6 gal batches as I leave a lot of the trub behind. Long story short my total grain is 25lbs and I want 7 gal to start my boil. Backing into my water i will need 7 gal boil + 3.13 gal absorption + .5 gal MLT dead space = total water of 10.63 gal. What should my initial mash volume be? If I do my normal 1.25qts/lb it only leaves about 2.5 gal to sparge with. Should I just put it all in during the initial mash? What is the norm for this much grain? What will get me the best efficiency?

If you know your boil off rate you can always sparge with more water and plan on a longer boil. You either burn more fuel and add more water or you sacrifice efficiency... an old trade off.
 
If you know your boil off rate you can always sparge with more water and plan on a longer boil. You either burn more fuel and add more water or you sacrifice efficiency... an old trade off.

If i go to a 90 min boil it will only add half a gallon. What if i sparged with more water to allow to me stir it up but only pull off what i need?
 
If you know your boil off rate you can always sparge with more water and plan on a longer boil. You either burn more fuel and add more water or you sacrifice efficiency... an old trade off.

If i go to a 90 min boil it will only add half a gallon. What if i sparged with more water to allow to me stir it up but only pull off what i need?
 
Here's the hop schedule I used for a 5g extract recipe. It's been bottled for two weeks now and tastes pretty close but still no carb bite... I think if you wanted closer to 70 IBU's you could cut on the Columbus and Simcoe by 0.25 each as the original is not that bitter. Brought it down to 72 IBU with 0.75 Columbus and 0.75 Simcoe when I recalculated. I still have a sixer of Hosplam I'm waiting to compare but I fear the original will have settled out the flavor. We'll see.

Also, IBU's were calculated after extract was mixed so I believe that's the reason for lower scale; at least my numbers were different compared to when I dropped the extract (beginning-lower, end-higher).

My schedule:
1oz Columbus 15% @ 60min (19IBU)
1oz Simcoe 13% @ 60min (16IBU)
1oz Chinook 11% @45min (13IBU)
1oz Centennial 10% @30min (10IBU)
1oz Citra 14% @ 15min (10IBU)
1oz Amarillo 10% @ 10min (5IBU)
2oz Simcoe 13% @ Turn Off (4.5 IBU)
2oz Amarillo 10% @ Turn Off (3IBU)

~80.5 IBU's Via Beer Alchemy Calculation.

Dry Hopped
3 oz Simcoe Secondary

Brewed March 14th
Racked to Secondary April 14
Bottled May 5th

Looking at this 3 years later. Were you happy with how this turned out?
 
Here's the recipe (very similar) I used for my Hopslam clone:

US 2 Row 14 LB - 8 oz
Vienna Malt 2 LB - 12 oz
20L Caramel (Crystal) 8 oz
40L Caramel (Crystal) 4 oz
2-Row Carapils® Malt 6 oz
Honey Malt 8 oz
Honey 1 LB - 6.4 oz

Columbus (US) Hop Pellets (First Wort) 0.5 oz
Simcoe (US) Hop Pellets (60 MIN) 0.5 oz
Chinook (US) Hop Pellets (45 MIN) 0.5 oz
Centennial (US) Hop Pellets (30 MIN) 0.5 oz
Citra® (US) Hop Pellets (15 MIN) 0.6 oz
Amarillo® (US) Hop Pellets (10 MIN) 1 oz
Amarillo® (US) Hop Pellets (0 MIN) 2 oz
Simcoe (US) Hop Pellets (0 MIN) 2 oz
Simcoe (US) Hop Pellets (Dry Hop 7 DAYS) 3 oz

I'm 9 days into fermentation and decided to take a hydro sample today. It was about 1.020, so it still has a little more to go. BTW, it was very delicious and a great way to start a Thursday morning!

However, I noted that the color was much lighter than most of the photos I've seen here and the Hopslams I've had before. My sample was closer to SRM 4 than SRM 8. I'm not sure why it came out so much lighter, or if it will darken as fermentation finishes and the yeast, et al, drop out. I did add the honey at the very end, but unless the color is supposed to come from caramelization of the honey being boiled longer, I don't think that's the reason.

I'll find out in a couple of weeks if it stays that light, but I guess as long as it tastes good, that's what's most important.

edit: I should've taken a picture but I was trying to keep everything sanitary and didn't want to handle my iphone in the middle of pulling a sample and resealing the fermenter.
 
Hey all- looks like a great recipe to use up last years remaining hops crop. I have Nugget & Centennial that I'd like to center the hops around, but realize that this may be a pretty one dimensional recipe. Any suggestions for perhaps ONE other variety at Flavor Addition (30 -15 mins), that might round out the profile?
Thanks - looks delicious!
 
How close is this to the original beer? I'm loving the real deal right now but would love to have some more later in the year. Is the hop schedule still good after all these years? The newest trend is adding all late hop additions I wonder how doing that would change the flavor profile in this recipe?
 
On their website, Bells sells a Hopslam all grain kit. They also list all the ingredients (see below). Because shipping would be almost $20 and the kit includes some stuff I don't need, I'd like source the stuff at my LHBS. What I don't have is the brew instructions.

I was wondering if anyone here had advice on the hop additions.

And the other part I'm looking for guidance on is the yeast. I've never done a starter before. I know it's not rocket science, but I'm wondering that if I used the WLP001, and just used twice the amount.. could I get by without doing a starter??

Ingredient List from Bells Clone Kit:


- (#10) Briess 2-Row Brewer's Malt

- (#5) Briess Pale Ale Malt

- (8 oz) Briess Caramel 40L Malt

- (12 oz) Honey Bear

- (1 oz) Crystal Hops

- (1 oz) Mosaic Hops

- (1 oz) Glacier Hops

- (1 oz) Centennial Hops

- (2 oz) Amarillo Hops

- (4 oz) Simcoe Hops

- (10 oz) Priming Sugar

- (1) Brewing instructions

- (1) Brew Log

- (1) Yeast culture information sheet
 
On their website, Bells sells a Hopslam all grain kit. They also list all the ingredients (see below). Because shipping would be almost $20 and the kit includes some stuff I don't need, I'd like source the stuff at my LHBS. What I don't have is the brew instructions.

I was wondering if anyone here had advice on the hop additions.

And the other part I'm looking for guidance on is the yeast. I've never done a starter before. I know it's not rocket science, but I'm wondering that if I used the WLP001, and just used twice the amount.. could I get by without doing a starter??

Ingredient List from Bells Clone Kit:


- (#10) Briess 2-Row Brewer's Malt

- (#5) Briess Pale Ale Malt

- (8 oz) Briess Caramel 40L Malt

- (12 oz) Honey Bear

- (1 oz) Crystal Hops

- (1 oz) Mosaic Hops

- (1 oz) Glacier Hops

- (1 oz) Centennial Hops

- (2 oz) Amarillo Hops

- (4 oz) Simcoe Hops

- (10 oz) Priming Sugar

- (1) Brewing instructions

- (1) Brew Log

- (1) Yeast culture information sheet
theelectricbrewery.com has a hopslam clone recipe on their site that I hear is very close. You will have to adjust their recipes for your efficiency as they assume 85% or something like that.
 
Has anyone made this, or anything with honey/sugar and had problems with a harsh bite at the end? I've been reading that if you add honey/sugar to the boil, the yeast eat that up first and are "tired out" when dealing with the rest of the fermentables.

I'm wondering if anyone else has had this experience or has any insight in this idea.
 
Haven't made this but I have a couple brews that use honey. I don't get any aggressive bite. How ever I have never gone higher than 2 pounds in a 5 gallon batch. I generally don't add honey until flameout or maybe with a minute left in the boil.
 
Has anyone made this, or anything with honey/sugar and had problems with a harsh bite at the end? I've been reading that if you add honey/sugar to the boil, the yeast eat that up first and are "tired out" when dealing with the rest of the fermentables.

I'm wondering if anyone else has had this experience or has any insight in this idea.
I have made this recipe as outlined on the first page. One batch with the corn sugar addition and WLP 001 the second batch with the honey addition and Wyeast 1056. Both were very smooth and delicious. My notes show the WLP had more hop aroma. I have a hard time getting WLP yeast where I am so used the 1056. Will make it again with sugar and 1056 in a day or so.
 
Anyone still brewing this? I'm looking for a grain bill that can stand up to a full pound of hops for a home brew club competition. Thinking this one should be able to. So here's the catch - it won't be Hopslam as I have to use only Legacy hops. Somebody donated about 30 pounds to our club, so now we're all brewing up a beer with them.
 
Anyone still brewing this? I'm looking for a grain bill that can stand up to a full pound of hops for a home brew club competition. Thinking this one should be able to. So here's the catch - it won't be Hopslam as I have to use only Legacy hops. Somebody donated about 30 pounds to our club, so now we're all brewing up a beer with them.
I'm still brewing it, currently drinking it though.
 
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