A little too bitter

So far I have made BB American Light, BB Weisenbier, and a Blond Ale Kit from my LHBS. The american light had a slight bit of bitterness and was pretty good, the weiserbier was too bitter for me even though it had the same IBU's as the American Light and the blonde is still in the primary right now. The american used saaz (1oz Bitter, 0.25oz Aroma), the weis used hatterau (1oz bitter, 0.5oz aroma), and the Blonde used Mt Hood (1oz bitter, 0.5oz aroma).

I've been reading on and on about different hops and there charcteristics. I would like to try some different hops. Would this be good? 1oz Cluster (Bittering), 0.5oz EKG (Aroma), or would you recommend something different. The recipe base is going to be probably similar to my Blonde Ale.

3lbs extra light DME
1lb rice solids
1lb honey

An ale bittered with cluster and using EKG for aroma sounds good. I'd want it to be more in the style of a british bitter, though: lose the rice solids and honey, and add in some 60L crystal malt instead, for a rounder, somewhat sweeter flavor. You could also add some oven-toasted two-row or some victory for a little nutty element to the flavor. Ferment with one of the british ale strains and you've got a winner of a session ale.

The ale I've got in primary right now is close to what I just described. Pick up a Boddington's Pub Ale at your local style, and if you like that, you'll like the sort of thing we're talk.ing about here.

FWIW, I think your weiss was a little overhopped for the style: a classic hefeweizen has very low IBUs (maybe 12-15) and no aroma hops at all (or very little).

Yeah...I thought my weiss shouldn't be that bitter, but that is what came in the kit. I was thinking about using WLP008 East Coast Ale Yeast or just using Nottingham. What do you think the difference in the 2 would be?

To me, Nottingham don't add anything to the brew flavorwise. Just alcohol.

Bump for which yeast to use. Nottingham or WL East Coast?

Are you doing full boil's or late extract additions? This makes more of a difference that you may realize on hop utilization. The first several batches that i made were more hoppy than they should have been as well IMO, but since i've started adjusting for the better utilization, they have been more "in style".

My last batch I added the extracts after 30min, but that batch is still in the primary so I don't know about this one yet. 1oz of Mt. Hood (Bittering) 60min, 0.5oz (Aroma) 10min.

MidRex said:

Bump for which yeast to use. Nottingham or WL East Coast?

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It's really a personal choice. One factor is cost. Nottingham is about $2 and the WL is about $7. The other factors are the yeast characteristics. Nottingham will attenuate a bit more than the WL East coast which will give you a higher alcohol content and will change the profile of the finished product. Nottingham is also a higher flocculating yeast and will settle out much easier. I would suggest trying the less expensive one and see how you like it. Then reproduce the batch using the other yeast next time. See which you like better. As to the hops, I would try cutting my bittering amount a bit to see how you like it. If you like what flavors you are experiencing but just don't like the strength try cutting back a little at a time. Maybe try 3/4 oz. of bittering instead of the full 1 oz.

So you would go with 3/4oz cluster for bittering and 1/2oz EKG for Aroma then for starters?

MidRex said:

So you would go with 3/4oz cluster for bittering and 1/2oz EKG for Aroma then for starters?

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That is my personal approach. If I like the flavors I am getting, but the bittering is too strong then I'd just cut back a little to see what it gives me. This way you aren't introducing a new characteristic flavor by trying a different hops. So yes that is what I'd try. In fact I am using Colombus and Cascade in a APA recipe and this time I am going to reduce the Colombus addition at the 60 minutes slightly just to take the edge down a little.

You should be converting your hop alpha acids into alpha acid units for more accurate measurements. ie: 1 aau = 1 ounce of 1 aa hops, so if I had 1 oz of 5.2 AA cascade, I would have 5.2 AAU's.
Using this method, you can adjust the amount of bitterness in a recipie with accuracy, making the balancing of your recipie easier.