American IPA Dogfish Head 60 Minute Clone (AG) & Extract

I have brewed this 3 times. I subbed nugget and centennial hops because of LHBS availability the first batch, then forgot i subbed it for batch 2 & 3. The first batch was horrible... I read lots of stuff based on the flavour I was getting and thought maybe I was getting too hot of doughballs in the mash. so I used rice hulls and stirred often with no change. This last batch, I thought for sure it was my water, so I learned about water salts, and adjusted for IPA. I also changed from Dry hopping for 14 days to 5 days. Just cracked open a bottle last night and again it's horrible. I've been sampling all batches from 1 week to 3 months, and it doesn't ever get any better...

It seems so many people can do this no problem, and even the other beers I make are all good, this is the only one I cannot get. It's also the only one I'm doing with such high IBU.

Any ideas where I could be screwing up, and is the nugget/ centennial that bad of a combo? I know I love amarillo/ simcoe combo but I'm leery of brewing this again without fixing something else.

 

I just came to see if I really needed to secondary to dry hop. There's my answer. Thanks Yooper!

 

All done brewing this. OG ended up a bit short at 1.063, BeerSmith2 estimated 1.066. My efficiency was around 69% for this brew which is the same as my first AG. Everything seemed to work out pretty smooth. The continuous hopping kept me busy during the boil. I was not able to sanitize and clean up during the boil like usual. It smells wonderful and tastes wonderful. I can't wait until this is finished.

Cheers

 

Mine is taking forever to carb - tried another last night. It's about 1/2 carbed. Tastes good though. Oh well - wait another 2 weeks... Drink different beer...

 

I really am starting to think its the nugget. I did do the second one with building from ro water. And I think my temp is OK, brewed some wicked wheat and blonde this summer

 

Brewed a 10 gallon batch of this today. Thanks for posting by the way. OG came out at 1.065. This is the first time making a big starter and I must say, what a difference 3L makes. Pitched about an hour ago and it is already bubbling away! Will post results with final product.

 

my OG came out to 1.029, any idea it was so far off from everyone elses?

 

About 10 different reasons come to mind, but unless you shed a little light on how you brewed it, it's all just shots in the dark!

 

i thought i followed the recipe for partial mash, changed the hops a little due to lhbs. the only thing i can think of is the temperature i brewed it at. Can you name some of the reasons my OG would be lower than normal?

 

Did you do a full boil? If not, you probably just didn't mix the top-up water with the wort well enough.

Also what temp. did you take your reading at? If the wort was hot or warm, you need to account for this.

Post the exact recipe you used and your method and we'll see.

 

Just wanted to say a big "THANK YOU" to Yooper for posting this recipe and to everyone else on this forum.

I did my first All Grain yesterday with this recipe and it went pretty smoothly. I made my first yeast starter on Thurs night, made a mash tun out of a cooler on Saturday, brewed on Sunday. Great Weekend! http://www.homebrewtalk.com/images/smilies/n045.gif

I did a 2.5 Gallon batch on my gas stove (no garage, backyard, etc. for propane). My Mash temp was 4 degrees low so I added a half gallon of hot water (180 degrees?) until I hit the temp and took a half gallon off of my sparge water. The glass lid on my brew kettle exploded and shards of glass fell into sparge water - minor setback - rinsed out kettle thoroughly, added more water to get up to temp.

Preboil Gravity was on the money, O.G. was a tiny bit off, not concerning though; I figured at this point in the brew day I'd be way off and running for the DME. Beginner's luck I guess.

However, I added the Warrior at 60 min, Amarillo at 35 min, & Simcoe at 30 min. but I didn't toss them in gradually, I just dumped all the hops at their intended times. Any idea how this might turn out differently than sprinkling in hops every few minutes? What are the benefits of sprinkling in hops through boil, is it something to do with hop utilization?

Thanks again Everyone!

 

Looking forward to brewing this in a couple days.

 

just bottled this today it tastes awesome

 

I am brewing this tomarow. My local HBS only had Maris Otter, since the I found someone who had Amber malt. Is thier a diffrence in batch taste/aperanc using one over the other?

 

Umm yea that is going to be one bitter beer. Sprinkling them in after the 35 min mark to the end of the boil is all flavor hopping. Just wait it out, it might not be too bad.

 

Where is everyone getting Simcoe hops from? I can't seem to find pellet hops, only leaf...

 

I got mine from nthomebrew.com

 

Hm, I specifically look for leaf for this recipe, especially for the dry hop portion.

 

did anyone find pacman still available at their lhbs? What is a good substitute if it is not available?

 

I was at my lhbs yesterday, they have 4

 

mine had some as well. this is my first time ever using an activator pack. is a yeast starter less necessary with a smack pack? maybe i should just take this question to the fermentation board.

 

I believe Wyeast 1056 is a good substitute for Pacman.

Cheers!

 

I got mine (Simcoe Pellets) at Brewers Outpost about a month ago. Looks like they're out of stock again though. Beer Making Kits, Wine Making Kits and Supplies

 

Been drinking a ton of DFH 60/90 lately, finally got some Simcoe from my LHBS so time to brew this up.

Is there really only an ounce or so of each in this recipe (not counting dry hop)?

I expected more....but I guess Simcoe is a pretty potent hop.....just surprises me that I'm only using 2oz total of Amarillo and Simcoe during the boil....but the recipe definitely seems to have the approval of everyone here and I'm not going to complain about having to buy less hops for a recipe (especially ones that can be harder to locate)

 

i just brewed this yesterday. My first all grain batch. Well my LHBS was out of the amber so i went with Maris Otter, but mine looks nowhere near as dark as these beers. my gravity was a little low to it was right at 1.064 which i am sure it has to do with inexpierience with all grain. I woke up this morning and had to add a blowoff. so everything took off well. thanks for the great reciepe. I look forward to trying it after the first of the year

 

Thanks Yoop, that's great news.
When I was in the LHBS I noticed they do have the Thomas Fawcett amber malt so there's no reason at all not to do this.
Only question is whether to do a "real AG" batch or be lazy and do a partial mash.....

Thinking about doing a 10g batch and fermenting half with US-05 and the other half with S-04.....

 

I will agree with that it is surprisingly light on color I recently brewed an imperial blonde that is darker than this beer. Either way I am positive it will taste great. Especially with all of the great reviews

 

YOOPER IS THE WOMAN!!!! I followed the recipe exactly as written. I kegged this to dry hop and tasted a warm, flat, sample two nights ago. This is going to be one of if not my best beers to date. Thank you Yooper for your continued guidance and contributions to your fellow brewers. It is greatly appreciated.

 

I've brewed this recipe probably 5 times now.. I wanted to get rid of some 2010 hops so instead of using Amarillo and Simcoe for the dry hops, I did 5 gallons with 2 oz of cascade and 5 gallons with 2 oz of chinook. This was after 1 week of fermentation.

Then I decided to step it up a bit and after 2 weeks I dry hopped with 2 oz in each 5 gallons with whole hop simcoe.

BOTH ARE UNIQUE & YUMMO!!!

 

Thanks a lot Yooper. I'm planning to brew this for my next batch (hopefully early next month) Just wondering if you have to sparge the grains? If so what temperature. I'll tried to look for it but 120 pages is a lot to read lol. I'm fairly new to brewing and this will be my first all-grain and i want to brew BIAB style because of the equipment i have. any input?

 

Just bottled this today and it tastes great. :rockin: I have never had a real DFH ale because I cannot get them here in Oklahoma, but if I did, this surely would be better because I made it! Thanks Yooper for the recipe! I can't wait for it to get carbed up. Need to get my hands on some more Simcoe to brew again. I let it ferment for 32 days in primary with the dry hopping in the last 11 days. It is a bit hazy (i'm assuming from the dry hopping pellets), but the taste more than makes up for it.

Cheers

 

Thank you for this recipe. Newb here, this will be my 4th batch total. Enjoy all the knowledge shared here.
Cheers!!!

Merry Christmas

 

Racked 10 gallons into 2 kegs yesterday. Maltier than expected but with the right dry hopping guidance I have received, I'm confident it will be a smash hit. OG 1.064 FG 1.010! 35 days in the primary. Big Pacman Starter.

 

After brewing 3 coopers kits -- lager, wheat, and draught; they all tasted the same to me by the way -- and one partial mash -- AHS Oatmeal Stout -- I had all the equipment gathered for AG. Found DFH60 clone recipe and after reading about 100 pages of instructions and questions and comments, decided to go with this one.

Oh boy!! I had no idea what I was in for and how many things could go wrong during an AG session. All Newbie mistakes ... nothing to do with the recipe. First, I miss the strike temp by about 4 degrees. I am sure it has to do with the program I was using to calculate the water temp. So, had to add about a gallon and a half of boiling water to bring the temp up to 153. Mash temp held really nicely. So at this point I am thinking I won't have to use all the water I heat up for sparge as I added some extra for mashing. Wrong! Not enough to collect 6.2 gallons. So, sparge with 1.2 more gallons. Wort starts to flow again. But does not stop at 6.2 or 6.3 or 7 gallons. At this point I am sweating ... mind you it was 33 degrees outside yesterday.

I guess water was just stuck and me adding more water opened up something. Anyway, I ended up with around 7.6 gallons of water with 1.050 SG at 130F. Quick question here, if anybody cares to answer, should I just have stopped collecting after what I needed or collect it all for all the sugar? Started to boil. Needless to say extra 2 hours wasted to boil off the extra wort to get to 6.2 gallons. Started to throw hops at this point. When got to about 10 minutes left I realize that it is vaporizing too much and I will end up with less than 5 gallons of wort. Started to sweat again!

Finished hopping and I was just below 5 gallons. Did not bother to do anything about it. OG: 1.071. Finally things started to look positive. Aerated and pitched Wyeast 1056 starter. After about half hour in the carboy I realize that there is about 2 inches of trub at the bottom. You gotta be kidding me! Sweat!! I am sure I will lose some more to dry hops. So, hopefully I will end up with 4 gallons of excellent IPA. Note to self: Next time collect 7 gallons and don't let it boil off so much.

More water, less water, more water, less water ... that's pretty much how I would summarize my first AG session. What a learning experience!

It started to ferment in about 3 hours. I hooked up a blow off tube. Today It has about 4 inches of krausen. Looking good.

Here is a picture of the hot little thing. Well, warm. Serously, I guess from very active fermentation it is not going below 68F in my 64F basement.

Thanks a lot to Yooper for the recipe. And other posters to this thread. Looking forward to tasting this beer in about a month or so.