Getting Tropical/Dank Hop Flavor in a Pale Ale

Greetings. I'm interested in brewing a nice, hoppy Pale Ale with a hop flavor profile that mixes the new 'tropical/mango' flavors of Citra with a nice dank/deep/clean hop whallop that isn't overly citrusy, piney or rough.

To this end, I was thinking about a blondish Pale Ale with Citra and Columbus in roughly equal amounts, and I'd appreciate some feedback on it. Here's the data:

American Pale Ale
OG 1.050
FG 1.014
5 SRM
36 IBU
US-05 Dry Yeast, rehydrated

9.0lb Golden Promise
0.5lb Light Carastan malt (15L)

Mash temp:152F. Minerals: 6g Gypsum, 4g CalcChlor, 1g Baking Soda (all minerals are half in mash, half in boil), Extra Acid: 3oz Acid Malt. All R/O water (3.5gal mash, 3gal sparge). Target profile: Ca=94, Mg=0, Na=18, Cl=77, SO4=127, Ratio=.60(bitter).

Hop Schedule:
(All are pellet, Columus is 15.4%, Citra is 11%)
first wort 0.3oz Columbus
15 mins 0.5oz Citra
5 mins 0.5oz Citra
5 mins 0.5oz Columbus
1 min 0.5oz Citra
1 min 0.5oz Columbus
20 mins 0.5oz Citra
20 mins 0.5oz Columbus
dry hop 0.5oz Citra
dry hop 0.5oz Columbus

Ferment at 64F for 2 weeks, dry hop in keg before force carbing.

I'm thinking Columbus here because I don't want the Centennial, Amarillo or Cascade grapefruit/tangerine punch in this beer if possible. I've had an all-Citra Cream Ale before, and really liked it.

Anyway, if anyone has any input, lemme know.

I read tropical/dank and thought Columbus/citra. Looks like you did a well. I think the schedule looks good if you're looking for a nice mix of dank/tropical. Even with the 100% citra burst pale I made, it came out tropical but still citrus. Brew it please and report back. Very interested in your hop combo!

The exact same thought jumped to my mind when I read the subject: Citra and CTZ.

sounds great! i find citra more powerful than columbus, so personally I might consider using more columbus than citra, but depends how much you like them (I like columbus more than citra tho)

Ok groovy. I'm brewing tomorrow so I'll post back here in about 3 weeks with the results.

Forget Citra, look into Rakau.

new brewer here; I thought Citra has more grapefruit and citrus flavors. Doesn't Simcoe have a lot of tropical fruit flavors?

biggestmuff said:

new brewer here; I thought Citra has more grapefruit and citrus flavors. Doesn't Simcoe have a lot of tropical fruit flavors?

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Citra is considered to be mango, papaya and pineapple. The only think I don't like about citra is the aroma sometimes reminds me of cat pee.

Simcoe is pine and citrus.

When made an all Citra brew, it was most definitely grapefruit. Not much tropical about it.

I'm serious, if you're looking for tropical, check out Rakau.

smalliewader said:

When made an all Citra brew, it was most definitely grapefruit. Not much tropical about it.

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I was quoting from a hop chart with the tropical fruits I posted earlier. I don't have much experience with citra.

Citra™, HBC 394

Citra™ is a special aroma hop variety developed by the Hop Breeding Company (a joint venture between John I. Haas, Inc. and Select Botanicals Group, LLC). It was released in 2007. Citra™ has fairly high alpha acids and total oil contents with a low percentage of cohumulone content. The variety imparts interesting citrus and tropical fruit characters to beer.

http://www.usahops.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=hop_info&pageID=8

ghpeel said:

with a hop flavor profile that mixes the new 'tropical/mango' flavors of Citra with a nice dank/deep/clean hop whallop that isn't overly citrusy, piney or rough.

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If you really want that type of character then use tropical hops at flameout/whirlpool... and use your dank hops (Apollo, Summit, Columbus, Chinook) in the dryhop. Do not mix them equally. If you put Citra in the dryhop, it will overtake everything else. But at flameout, it helps to balance some of the dankness in the dryhop.

bobbrews said:

If you really want that type of character then use tropical hops at flameout/whirlpool... and use your dank hops (Apollo, Summit, Columbus, Chinook) in the dryhop. Do not mix them equally. If you put Citra in the dryhop, it will overtake everything else. But at flameout, it helps to balance some of the dankness in the dryhop.

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Cool tip. I already brewed this today as-is, and I already pre-mixed my hops for the dry hopping, but I'll definitely remember this for next time if the beer ends up with the Citra dominating. I do like Citra anyway, so I'm not too cornered if this first batch is too heavy in that direction.

BudzAndSudz said:

Forget Citra, look into Rakau.

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After this one is tapped, I'll look into it. I assume that's one of the new NZ varieties?

You are correct sir. http://www.breworganic.com/organic-new-zealand-rakau-pellet-hops.aspx

I used it recently in my clone of Funkwerks' Tropic King saison. Incredible hop with absolutely fantastic flavor and aroma.

You are correct sir. http://www.breworganic.com/organic-new-zealand-rakau-pellet-hops.aspx

I used it recently in my clone of Funkwerks' Tropic King saison. Incredible hop with absolutely fantastic flavor and aroma.

Simcoe!!!@!!!!

I bottled a beer with citra and NZ hallertauer today.

0.50oz citra @ 60
1.00oz NZ hallertuer @ 20
1.5oz citra @ 10

IBU was 50-60ish

There was a nice tropical fruit aroma that reminded me of a fruity bubble gum. The light dank aroma that was present at the primary sample disappeared already.

Whatever they use in Three Floyds Black Sun Stout is tropical and dank.

Have you ever had a tropical and sort of dank stout?

It's better than it sounds. I was pleasantly surprised the first time I tasted one.

BudzAndSudz said:

You are correct sir. http://www.breworganic.com/organic-new-zealand-rakau-pellet-hops.aspx

I used it recently in my clone of Funkwerks' Tropic King saison. Incredible hop with absolutely fantastic flavor and aroma.

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Ha, I just made a TK clone as well. I need to sit down and directly compare it to a bottle of TK but it's easily my best beer so far.

Did you talk to Gordon or just wing it? I haven't drank any of mine yet but the recipe is spot on (they straight up gave me their recipe haha) so I'm feeling pretty confident that it'll be similar

BudzAndSudz said:

Did you talk to Gordon or just wing it? I haven't drank any of mine yet but the recipe is spot on (they straight up gave me their recipe haha) so I'm feeling pretty confident that it'll be similar

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i did email gordon and he sent me the recipe too. i'm a partial mash/extract brewer so i had to play around with it a bit to make it fit with my process. mine is definitely a little darker than TK, but the taste is definitely similar. it will have been bottled for 3 weeks this weekend so that's when i'll do the direct comparison. i'm sure it's close.

Well I pulled a sample off the primary today, and it is indeed heading it the direction I wanted. The aroma is a deep, well-rounded hop smell, with a very slight fruity sweet smell in the mix too. I fermented the US-05 at 65-66, so I'm thinking thats the Citra coming through. I haven't added the dry hops yet. I'll so some searching, but have folks had OK success with keg hoping with pellet hops? I'm thinking of doing that after giving this one another week in the primary and a week of cold crashing. I'll prob use a 1gal paint strainer bag tied up with strings with the 1oz of Cita/Columbus mix in the bag, dry hopped at room temp under some C02 pressure, for about 5-6 days before extracting the bag and carbing it up.

personally I think you should use more dry hops, but that's just me.

bwomp313 said:

personally I think you should use more dry hops, but that's just me.

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Yeah I'm going very mild on the dry hopping because I haven't used Citra or Columbus before, and this is actually my first time doing a normal Chilling procedure on a beer in at least 25 batches (been a dedicated 'No Chiller' for 2 years now probably). So I kinda wanted to see what a good set of late boil additions taste like with this new recipe.

After this batch, if I am satisfied with it, I'll tweak it to be a Citra-bomb and see if I like that better. :rockin:

Well it took this one a little bit of time to mellow out to my liking, but I am indeed happy with the results. One surprising thing is that this beer is seriously the clearest ale I've ever done for sure, for whatever reason. I'm talking BMC Lager Clear.

The taste is a nice fruity hop punch, and the aroma is great. One person said they "want to stuff a pillow with the smell". The Columbus was the dominant flavor when young, strangly, but the Citra is coming through entirely now. As it cleared, it got less bitter, perhaps from hop particles settling out in the keg. I will use Honey Malt next time because this one is a touch thin in the body and could use a little more sweetness.

Final report, the keg blew foam on a pint I pulled today, so the first batch is totally gone. I will tell you that this beer got MUCH better after 3-4 weeks in the keg. It was good to start with, but the hop flavor was a touch harsh. It mellowed out into a rounder, sweeter(?) hop flavor by the end and was quite good. It's the best hoppy beer Ive brewed in a long time.

Some final thoughts: the body was pretty thin, intentionally here to focus on the hops, but if you like more balance, then throw in some Munich or Marris Otter. Or maybe up the crystal to a full pound. Or mash warm. Whatever, you get the point.

The beer got a touch less bitter after a few weeks, I think because hop particles were falling out of suspension. By the end it wasn't scorchingly bitter or anything, so if you want that super-deep bitterness, then throw in some Chinok or something else at 60min. I don't like super bitter IPAs so I'm keeping the IBUs where they are at.

Variants: I am thinking that this hop combo would be awesome in something unusual like an American Wheat. The tropical fruit mote from the Citra would be quite tasty in some wheat. Maybe back off the Columbus in that case.

So to summarize, this recipe is solid and will be repeated in the future. It was a touch "rough" so don't be afraid to let it age for a month in the keg. The hop flavor and aroma did not really diminish much in that first month, but that rough "fuel" kinda smell did drop out. And this was more Gypsum than I've ever used before and it turned out fine, so don't fear the minerals if you are brewing with all RO water.