First recipe formulation - IPA

This is my first attempt at creating a recipe from scratch. I've tweaked recipes before, but for this one, I just glanced at a couple IPA recipes, then went on my own. Let me know what you think. I'm going for a basic IPA, somewhat on the strong side. All hops are pellets, although I would like to try dry-hopping with leaves, if someone would like to throw out an amount to use.

1# Crystal 20L
6# X-Light DME
3# Light DME

1 oz Perle (60 min)
1 oz Cascade (60 min)
1 oz Perle (30 min)
1 oz Cascade (30 min)
1 oz Williamette (15 min)
1 oz Saaz (end of boil)
1 oz Tettnanger (dry-hop)

White Labs California Ale yeast

Expected OG = 1.086
Expected FG = 1.021
Expected ABV = 8.7%
IBU = 57.2
SRM = 10

That's quite a mishmash of hop flavor/aromas. Are you shooting for any one particular style or something like an IPA that you've had?

IMO the cascade and Willamette will clash with the saaz/tett aroma and cover much of the saaz. If anything, I'd bitter with willamette and 1oz perle, drop the cascade and move the rest of the perle towards the end of the boil with the saaz and tett.

mmb said:

That's quite a mishmash of hop flavor/aromas. Are you shooting for any one particular style or something like an IPA that you've had?

IMO the cascade and Willamette will clash with the saaz/tett aroma and cover much of the saaz. If anything, I'd bitter with willamette and 1oz perle, drop the cascade and move the rest of the perle towards the end of the boil with the saaz and tett.

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I am new to brewing and was wondering how you know what hops work well together and which don't. Is is just experience, or is there a book/website that can help explain. thanks

It's a combination. Some hops have a light aroma and some are very bold and brash. Others compliment each other very well.

Here's a link to a good description of different hops.

Hop Data - Brew-Monkey.Com

thanks for the link, but i think there is something wrong with that site. there is an overlay of ads on the descriptions which makes it hard to read.

Works fine for me (Firefox 3.0.6).

Anyway, there's nothing wrong with a mishmash of hops. The most popular beer at a brewery for which I used to work was brewed with 7 different varieties. It'll just end up "hoppy" instead of "Cascades" or "Fuggles" or something. A nicer word for 'mishmash' is 'melange'. Brew it up and see what happens! I think you'll be pleased.

Oh, and for the record - we use hops flowers, not leaves.

Carry on!

Bob

NQ3X said:

Works fine for me (Firefox 3.0.6).

Anyway, there's nothing wrong with a mishmash of hops. The most popular beer at a brewery for which I used to work was brewed with 7 different varieties. It'll just end up "hoppy" instead of "Cascades" or "Fuggles" or something. A nicer word for 'mishmash' is 'melange'. Brew it up and see what happens! I think you'll be pleased.

Oh, and for the record - we use hops flowers, not leaves.

Carry on!

Bob

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Oh, I agree, a blend of hops is nice in some instances, but mixing Saaz with Cascade makes me a sad panda because I love the way Saaz comes across.

It would be like making a hop blend with EKG and Chinook.

NQ3X said:

Works fine for me (Firefox 3.0.6).

Oh, and for the record - we use hops flowers, not leaves.

Click to expand...

Good to know, the recipe formulation site I used had hops options of pellets, plugs or leaves, so I just went with that.

In response to others, I'll readily admit I haven't been doing this long enough to know the profile of different hops varieties. I picked those particular hops based primarily on their AA% and the fact that I know my LHBS carries them. Does the ratio of bittering to aroma hops look ok? I'll check out that link and see if that doesn't influence me at all. Thanks guys!