First Recipe Suggestions

[pdm1982]

After making several all grain batches from other people's recipes, I've decided to give making my own recipe a try. I'm going with an IPA. I've done a bit of reading but most of this is just guess work; especially with the hops. Feel free to make any suggestions. Here's what I came up with in Beersmith:

Recipe Type: All Grain
Yeast: White Labs California ale
Yeast Starter: 1 liter
Batch Size (Gallons): 5.5
Original Gravity: 1.066
Estimated Final Gravity: 1.014
IBU: 65.8
Estimated ABV: 6.9%
Boiling Time (Minutes): 60
Primary Fermentation (# of Days & Temp): 7 days @ 67F
Secondary Fermentation (# of Days & Temp): 14 days @ 67F
Estimated Efficiency: 65%

Mash at 152 for 60 minutes

2 Row Pale: 13 lbs (85%)
Munich I: 12 oz (5%)
Crystal 60L: 12 oz (5%)
Victory: 6 oz (2.5%)
Carapils: 6 oz (2.5%)

1.00 oz Amarillo (First Wort as 20 min) 14.5 IBU
0.50 oz Columbus (60 min) 23.6 IBU
1.00 oz Centennial (15 min) Hops 15.3 IBU
1.00 oz Cascade (10 min) Hops 7.5 IBU
1.00 oz Cascade (5 min) Hops 4.1 IBU
1.00 oz Cascade (1 min) Hops 0.9 IBU
3.00 oz Citra (Dry Hop 14 days) Hops

 

[estricklin]

Oh don't waste the precious Amirillo by first wort hopping with it! On the other hand I think it's awesome that your first wort hopping. I think your recipe is pretty damn good too, though 14 days may be a bit too long for dry hopping, it can get grassy/cloudy after that long.

Good luck, and congrats on your first recipe!

 

[pdm1982]

Maybe I'll sub some Citra in for the Amarillo. I also considered dropping the Columbus (and the 60 min addition all together). I might play around with doing some blended additions of Citra and Amarillo for the first wort and at 30, 15, 10, 5, and 1 instead of the Centennial and Cascade. I'm not at home right now so I don't know what IBU's I'd be looking at by doing that. Just an idea. Also, maybe it would be wise to knock back the dry hop time to 7-10 days instead of 14.

 

[RonPopeil]

Looks good and will certainly work. I also question the amarillo for bittering. Not that it won't work but 14IBU from a 9% AA hop sounds off. But saving a great aroma hop for aroma is a good idea as well.

I feel that 14 days of dry hopping is excessive. You could easily get away with 7 days.

Don't drop the bittering addition all together. You will need it or else you'll have hop flavored barley soda. I've made a couple of those. And Citra is another hop to save for aroma/flavor ideally.

If you want to swap things around a bit try bittering with columbus. CTZ is a great bittering hop.

 

[pdm1982]

Ok cool. So I'll keep the Columbus at 60 then. The reason I was going to use Amarillo or Citra as the first wort is because I thought it was more of a flavor/aroma addition similar to a 20min addition. Are you saying I should look at using the Columbus there as well to gain more bitterness?

Also, the reason why my IBU's seem low from the Amarillo is that I used the 7.5% AA that my LHBS told me. Seems low to me too.

 

[dobe12]

Looks tasty. I agree, 14 days is too long to dry hop. Cut that down to somewhere between 3 - 7 days.

Personally, for those late additions and dry hop, I'd take the citra, centennial, and cascade and blend them together. Then add an ounce or so to each addition and 2-3 oz for dry hop. I may even cut back the citra to 2oz. I love citra, but it can be a dominating hop.

 

[pdm1982]

Yeah that makes sense. Really ramp up the flavor and aroma. I just brewed a IIPA that used 1.5 Citra and 1.5 Simcoe for dry hop and the sample I pulled was nice. So maybe I'll blend the dry hop or, like you said, cut it to just 2oz. I will definitely heed everyone's advice on reducing the length of the dry hop. I also like the idea of blending the late hop additions.

Come to think of it my IIPA has been on the dry hops 8 days already. Might be time to pull it out.

 

[dobe12]

I've been on a single hop pale ale kick recently (Amarillo PA kegged, and a Munich/Cascade SMaSH currently fermenting). But when I do use multiple hops, I generally blend them together for the late additions. I like the final product using this method.

 

[pdm1982]

I finally got around to brewing this recipe. I used the above malt list but I changed the hops to the following:

First Wort (as 20 min addition)
.5 oz Centennial
.5 oz Cascade

15 Minute Addition
.5 oz Centennial
.5 oz Cascade
.5 Citra

10 Minute Addition
.5 oz Centennial
.5 oz Cascade
.5 Citra

5 Minute Addition
.5 oz Centennial
.5 oz Cascade
.5 Citra

1 Minute Addition
.5 oz Centennial
.5 oz Cascade
.5 Citra

2 oz Citra Dry Hop for 7 days.

Came out to roughly 63 IBU. I hit all my numbers so I guess I'll just wait to see how it comes out.

 

[pdm1982]

In case anyone is curious or interested, I transferred this over to my secondary on 2 oz of Citra hops. The sample I took was very promising. The SG reading was 1.012 putting me just over 7% ABV. The sample was a light orange color; much lighter than I expected. The flavor was very hoppy and fruity. Since the hops are so young and dominate I couldn't make out too much else but it did have some good sweetness to it also. Hopefully it will have a balanced malt backbone once it all comes together. I don't want to get too excited because I still need to bottle and carb them, but from what I can tell it should be a pretty good beer. I'll update as I go.

 

[pdm1982]

I bottled this batch yesterday. I got 51 beers out of it. The sample I took was primarily just hop flavor. I really couldn't taste anything else. I'm hoping once it's carbed up and fully conditioned the hops will mellow out a bit so I can taste the malts. My guess is that most beers pulled right off the dry hops and sampled are just going to taste like hops. Not too concerned...yet.

 

[RonPopeil]

at this point the only thing to be concerned about is whether or not it's overly bitter. strong hop flavor is good. leave it condition for two weeks post carbonation.

 

[pdm1982]

Yep won't know what I have until then. Patiently waiting.


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[pdm1982]

Ok, I had my first bottle of this last night. It poured a dark copper (almost hazy brown) color and was very cloudy. I held it up to the light and it blocked it out; not translucent at all. Besides it being an ugly color, it tasted strange. The hops were fine but there was a weird sweetness. Not the worst thing I've ever made but still a little disappointing. I'm not sure if I used too many malt varieties or what. I'm not an expert at diagnosing where certain flavors come from. In the future, I might try dropping the Victory malt altogether and possibly either the Munich I or Crystal 60L. I guess I have 50 mediocre beers to drink while I think about it...

Any advice is appreciated.

 

[chickypad]

So it was clear light orange when packaging and now it's darker cloudy and off tasting? This doesn't sound like a recipe issue. It was only 9 days in the bottle maybe the yeast are still working. I'd give them another week plus then chill a few for a good several days and try again. Oxidation can cause darkening and supposedly a sweet/sherry like flavor, but I don't think that's enough time for that to have developed so badly.

 

[pdm1982]

You're correct on the time in bottle. I know I opened one a little soon. I normally check one a week and start drinking them at about 3 weeks in bottle. It did appear to have bubbles in suspension so I presume that's due to it still carbing up. I thought my grain ratios looked ok but I'm a beginner...so there's also that.

As far as oxidation goes; I only aerate right before I pitch the yeast. I'm typically pretty gentle while racking to secondary and bottling but anything's possible.

 

[pdm1982]

I just came to a bad realization. I recently noticed a red bubble at the top of my thermometer and replaced it. However, I would have brewed this batch with the old one before noticing it was malfunctioning. I just compared the new one to the old one. The old one is low by 3 or 4 degrees. That means my strike water temp was off, the mash temp was off, and the yeast starter pitch temp was off. Here I thought I nailed it. I probably mashed at around 156-157.

This may explain a lot since the batch before this one was an IPA recipe (that got good reviews on here) and it tastes very similar. It's weirdly sweet as well and is almost undrinkable. I had made several mistakes on that brew day so I attributed the bad beer to that. All along betrayed by my own equipment.

So now how to proceed? I suppose I'll wait a bit and see how this one finishes up. However, due to the thermometer lying to my face, I might not be as inclined to change the recipe before I brew it again. What a kick in the ass.

 

[RonPopeil]

if you mashed at 156 then your finish of 1.012 is damn good.

 

[pdm1982]

I made a 1 liter starter but yeah I know what you're saying. Seems likely to finish higher with more unfermentables from a hot mash. I'm stumped.

 

[Facinerous]

How is the sediment looking in the bottom of your bottles. When you opened your first one was it chilled?

One thing I have noticed is, if you open a bottle warm that has a little extra sediment on the bottom all the sediment will immediately come back up into suspension no matter how you pour. When the bottles are ready, let them chill for a few days before having another. That may resolve some of your clarity issues, and for that matter maybe some of that flavor as well. If your really in the experiment mode, throw one of your bottles in the fridge today and let it chill for maybe 48 hours. Then see how that one comes out.

Your attenuation and malt schedule leads me to believe that your beer should not be overly sweet. Maybe just a bit more due to your thermometer. So some of that sweetness could be from your priming sugar if you have only waited a week or so since bottling. I didn't pay attention to the dates of your posts in this thread.

 

[pdm1982]

There is some sediment for sure. I had refrigerated the bottle I drank for a few hours. I poured somewhat roughly so I'm sure I kicked everything up in the bottle.

As far as the thermometer goes; what's done is done. As others have mentioned, the final gravity suggests that it wasn't too big of an issue. I'll wait another week then throw some in the fridge for a day or two. I think I'll cool my heels on playing detective until then.

As a side note, I just tested my hydrometer in room temperature tap water and it appears to be working properly.

 

[pdm1982]

So....I may have panicked a bit prematurely. I am drinking one of these beers as I type this. The strange sweetness is gone. The initial sweetness was probably was from the priming sugar, as someone previously suggested. It's still pretty cloudy and there is a lot of sediment. The next time I brew it I may cold crash it or let it finish for a few weeks before bottling. Other than that I'm content leaving the recipe as is. It's a really good beer.

Thanks everyone for the advice. I probably didn't need to spazz out. Anyways, if you're looking for a recipe to brew next I'd recommend this one.