Simple IPA Recipe Critique

Can anyone make sure my recipe is okay. It's pretty simple, but I just want to make sure that everything is balanced out enough. (mainly the honey malt, should I just not include it?)

I'm looking for a smoothly hopped crisp citrus beer. An IPA bordering on the line of a pale ale with great aroma. Something close to Bell's two harted ale, but in the ~45 IBU range. I am trying to get a nice orange color.

I'm leaning towards the 1056 for the yeast, but I like the idea of having a nice bright beer, which is why I have 1272 listed.


Thanks for any help.


Bottling Volume: 5.00 gal
Estimated OG: 1.060 SG
Estimated Color: 11.6 SRM
Estimated IBU: 49.0 IBUs
Brewhouse Efficiency: 72.00 %
Est Mash Efficiency: 75.6 %
Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Ingredients:
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Amt Name Type # %/IBU
10 lbs Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM) Grain 1 87.0 %
1 lbs Caramel/Crystal Malt - 80L (80.0 SRM) Grain 2 8.7 %
8.0 oz Munich Malt - 10L (10.0 SRM) Grain 3 4.3 %
1.00 oz Centennial [10.00 %] - First Wort 60.0 m Hop 4 41.5 IBUs
1.00 oz Cascade [5.50 %] - Boil 10.0 min Hop 5 7.5 IBUs
1.00 oz Citra [12.00 %] - Boil 0.0 min Hop 6 0.0 IBUs
1.0 pkg American Ale II (Wyeast Labs #1272) [124 Yeast 7 -
1.00 oz Citra [12.00 %] - Dry Hop 0.0 Days Hop 8 0.0 IBUs


Mash Schedule: Single Infusion, Medium Body, Batch Sparge
Total Grain Weight: 11 lbs 8.0 oz
----------------------------
Name Description Step Temperature Step Time
Mash In Add 6.03 gal of water at 158.9 F 152.0 F 60 min

I don't get "citrus" from citra- I get MANGO and other tropical fruit from citra. That's great if that's what you want, but if you want citrus I'd suggest amarillo, cascade or centennial. Centennial is the signature hop in Bell's Two Hearted with the floral citrusy finish.

I think the honey malt and crystal malt is ok, although I rarely (almost never) use honey malt. The amounts look fine.

I don't see your IBUs or your OG, but you may need to increase the FWH/60 minute hops a bit if the IBUs are a bit low. I'd shoot for 45 IBUs if the OG is about 1.050.

Looks good to me so far. Pretty simple, nothing crazy. That will make a decent enough beer.

A few months ago I made a Citra beer with only late hop Citra additions and it was good, but not great. Everyone drank it but to me it seemed a bit too one dimensional. From now on I'm going to use Citra in combination with other hops because of this. So this is just me, but I'd toss something in there to make it a bit more interesting. That said, your beer that way would turn out fine, this is just personal preference on my part.

Yooper said:

I'd suggest amarillo, cascade or centennial. Centennial is the signature hop in Bell's Two Hearted with the floral citrusy finish.

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This is what I was going to suggest. I'd toss some amarillo or centennial in there.

Thank you! I added the IBU and OG. I will scratch the honey malt and maybe bump up the crystal to a pound. I will see if I can get amarillo hops and use them as my bittering hops @ 60 minutes instead of FWH.

^I totally agree w/Yoop on the hop suggestions. Citra is a sweet, tropical fruit heavy hop. If you want citrus, Amarillo is king. Centennial and Cascade are fantastic as well.

I build my IPA/APA hop schedules based on percentage and work backwards. Generally, I like to have the IBU's on my APA's be around 80% of the OG (40 IBU's for a 1.050 beer) and bump that up to 100 - 110% for my IPA's.

Once I have my target IBU, I plan my first addition (boil hops) to account for 1/3 of the total IBU's. This gives me plenty of room to add in late additions starting at 20 minutes.

Consider working some Munich 10L into your grain bill to help develop a nice orange color. The crystal 80 should be a great choice to help round out the color. Guessing you should shoot for an SRM of ~ 9.

I changed everything around, looks like amarillo are tough to get so I used Centennial for my bittering addition and Cascade for my aroma/flavor additions. and Citra for the aroma hops. that gives my 49 IBUs with a 1060 OG and a nice orange color SRM 11.

Bells two harted are at the limit of my wife's taste buds, so I think this should work nicely. Thanks for all of your help!

NervousDad said:

Thank you! I added the IBU and OG. I will scratch the honey malt and maybe bump up the crystal to a pound. I will see if I can get amarillo hops and use them as my bittering hops @ 60 minutes instead of FWH.

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Be careful on bumping up the crysta that much. Typically IPAs are drier in an effort to showcase the hops. That much crystal will add a lot of sweetness which is contrary to this. I even see people adding corn sugar to dry the beer out

I like the recipe better, BUT.......(always a but, I think!)

Crystal 80L is nice, but a whole pound is a lot in an IPA. If you want a whole pound of crystal (and you just might, as it can be pretty good especially if 2HT is big enough for your wife!), I'd "layer" the crystal. What I mean is use .75 pound of 40L and .25 pound of 40L. 80L is starting to get a bit raisiny, and less is more with the darker crystals.

I'd also consider upping the Munich and lowering the base two-row, to keep the same OG but increase the malt backbone.

Yooper thank you, that is the exact flavor (raisiny) that my wife doesn't like, but we couldn't put our finger on it in (DFH 60 minute and Stone pale ale). I will definitely back off the crystal then

NervousDad said:

Yooper thank you, that is the exact flavor (raisiny) that my wife doesn't like, but we couldn't put our finger on it in (DFH 60 minute and Stone pale ale). I will definitely back off the crystal then

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If you don't like raisiny, stay away from darker crystals! But the DFH 60 minute doesn't have dark crystal malt, it has more of an "amber malt" taste to it.

Crystal 40L is sweet and a good crystal for IPAs and APAs. You could go as high as 60L without raisin (more toffee than raisin) but you may find that your wife likes crystal 20L as the majority of the crystal, with a hint of 40L or 60L for complexity.

So I'm about to cold crash this, I took a gravity reading and now I'm nervous. It smells like cat pee I used whole flower citra hops I hop that wasn't a problem. If I dry hop with another hop, do you think it would cover the aroma?

Give it some time, the aroma will change quite a bit over a few weeks.

NervousDad said:

So I'm about to cold crash this, I took a gravity reading and now I'm nervous. It smells like cat pee I used whole flower citra hops I hop that wasn't a problem. If I dry hop with another hop, do you think it would cover the aroma?

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"Cat pee" comes usually from chinook or simcoe. Citra is more "mango".

Does it taste like it smells?

I was afraid to taste

NervousDad said:

I was afraid to taste

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What a wimp! A little cat pee is good for you. Now you can recognize it as an off-flavor and become a beer judge.

Seriously, something might help. But I'm not a citra fan to begin with (way too Juicy Fruit Gum for me) so I'm not sure more citra would do it. How about amarillo, if you have some? It goes so well with simcoe and chinook (the notorious cat pee hops) that maybe it'll help. Otherwise, I'm sorry- I have no idea.

I am a wimp I cold crashed it and just checked on it, the "aroma" is gone! I'll taste it in two more days to determine if I'm going to keg it or not.

Just had my first glass and it turned out delicious! Thanks for the help!