Honey malt

I'm planning on brewing a Honey Rye IPA with the following grain bill (4.5 gallon batch):

2 row - 9 lb (73%)
rye - 2.5 lb (20%)
honey malt - 0.75 lb (7%)

Should I add any crystal malt or do you think the honey malt will be enough? Is 7% of the grain bill overkill?

The honey malt starts to be noticable at about 5% of the grain bill. At 7%, you are going to taste a good bit of sweetness in the beer. I think the rye would balance this pretty nicely. As long as that's what you're going for, you're good, if you want the sweetness to be subtle, tone it back to 5%.

How did this work out?

Turned out really good. The honey malt wasn't too overpowering at all. I love the head retention due to the rye. The head would look like this the entire time drinking.



I did end up tweaking the recipe. For a 5.5 gallon batch:

11 lb 2 row
3.5 lb Rye Malt
1 lb Honey Malt
1 lb Rice hulls

1.5 oz Magnum - 60 min
1 oz Amarillo - 20 min
1 oz Amarillo - 10 min
0.5 oz Amarillo - 5 min

1 oz Amarillo - dry hop
0.5 oz Cascade - dry hop

I mashed at 154 since US-05 tends to finish drier than I want.

Gonna have to write this recipe down! Cheers!