Hop usage

I'm using 5 lbs light DME and 3 lbs amber DME for fermentables... maybe adding in a little dextrose to "dry out" the beer to allow the hoppyness to come out (anyone done this?). I was wondering how you all would recommend using the hops I got:

2 oz Chinook
2 oz Cascade
1 oz Amarillo
1 oz Golding

Chinook will be for bittering (full boil), but any suggestions on when to add the others for good balance of flavor/aroma? I can only do a 1.5 gal boil so I'm doing a hop tea... but don't know how much hops to use in the wort and how much in the tea?

how many gallons are we talking about for the final amount? If this is a 5 gal recipe i calculate your starting gravity at 1.068 which is fairly high unless your looking at brewing an IPA for example. If thats what your looking for then i would recomend buying some specialty hops like crystal or caramunich to add some added body to it (you would steep it before the boil in a hop bag). Better yet, check out this recipe:
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f69/skinny-shamrocks-hop-riffic-ipa-70215/

Obviously you would tweak it a bit but you get the general idea hopefully.

scinerd3000 said:

If thats what your looking for then i would recomend buying some specialty GRAIN like crystal or caramunich to add some added body to it (you would steep it before the boil in a hop bag).

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ftfy!
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That's a lot of fermentables for such a small boil volume. If you want it to be hoppy I'd recommend searching here for the late extract method and use that, you'll get more bittering out of your hops.

Based on the hops you listed I would pick the highest AA as my bittering (probably the Chinook or Amarillo) and use the Cascade for flavor and aroma. I'd also recommend investing in some brewing software if you want to keep designing your own recipes.

Finally, I would skip the dextrose, it's not really going to help bring out any hoppiness and is completely unnecessary imo.

I also would skip the dextrose. With three pounds of Amber DME, I don't know that you really need more specialty grains, either.

The late extract idea is a good one, but I would rather see you boil a larger volume. For a beer that big, you need to boil at least 3 gallons to make it work right, and you will see tremendous improvement with a full wort boil. With the wort concentration you will have on a 1.5 gallon boil, you will have serious issues with kettle carmelization and even, possible scorching. That's before you even get into hop utilization.

If you can't go out and get yourself a five-gallon kettle or larger, try to keep your beers in the 1.050-55 range, tops. Even that is pushing it.


TL

You convinced me to buy a larger brew pot before I do this brew...

As for the late extract addition, how much would I want to add for the beginning of the boil and how much to save for the late addition? Would it be better to add the light and amber at different times?