Still no hop aroma - what am i doing wrong?

I've brewed a couple dozen DME batches so far; all of which have been some form of IPA. I'm going for a super hoppy west coast IPA.
I started out using large amounts of hops (10oz) in my 5 gallon batches and dryhopping another 2 oz. I've dryhopped for 1 - 2 weeks.
I'm getting frustrated with not getting what I'm looking for.
Could it simply be water? I add about a teaspoon of gypsum for extra minerals, but I'm doing that blind as I don't have access to a good water calculation.
I stick to only dry, clean yeast; as to not interfere with the aroma too.
I've switched to kegs and force carbonate, as I've heard bottle conditioning will flush out the aroma. I've started dry-hopping in the keg now too, which I think has helped, but still not what I'm looking for.
I'm looking for any suggestions that could help get the aroma kicked into gear from some meathod I'm missing.
I always end up with a decent ale, but nothing great.
Cheers!

 

What does your hop schedule look like? Water chemistry *could* be part of it, but its easier to address hop schedules first.

Also my experience thus far with dry hopping that, less is more. Less time, more hops. I like to start my dry hoppign when I transfer to secondary and I leave the hops loose, I imagine you could put them in a bag and get this same effect, but when I transfer to secondary I put the dry hops in so the circulation mixes the hops up really nice.

 

Give us the recipe from your last try.

 

Here's my pretty standard schedule. I've reduced it since buying 10 oz didn't seem to do anything...

2 oz at 60 min.
0.5 oz at 30
0.5 oz at 15
0.5 oz at 5 min
0.5 oz at FO
I always tend to buy different hops each time to get an idea of the flavors. A bitter for the 60 min, like apollo or warrior, then something lower AA for the later additions, like cascade, citra, etc.
Primary until done, then I cold crash and rack into my keg. I used to rack into a secondary, but since I've converted to keg, I stopped doing that and hasn't really changed anything.
I put 2 oz of something tasty, like citra, in a mesh bag with marbles in the keg, carb it and let it sit for about a week before I try it.

My malt bill is usually light-amber (depends on what the LHBS has in stock).

 

i'd double or triple up those FO and DH additions.

 

On a 5 gallon batch your using too much bittering and not enough aroma additions. Try using 1oz of Magnum at 60, move your 30min addition to 20min, and then increase the rest of the additions to 1oz (or more, from 5min to FO).

My most recent IPA recipe went like this and has an incredible nose/aroma:

60min: 1oz Magnum (next time I'll lower this to .75oz)
15min: 1oz Citra
05min: 1oz Palisades
01min: 1oz Palisades
Dry hop: 1oz Amarillo + 1oz Centennial

 

I agree with the above. 4 oz in an IPA isn't a whole lot. especially if you want a lot of hop aroma and flavor. I have battled this a little myself but now my hop schedules for an IPA are like this:
60 min - 1oz
10 min - 1oz
5 min - 1oz
FO - 1 oz
Dry hop - 2oz

I usually don't do anything between 60 min and 10 min on an IPA. I allow the 60 min addition to do all the bitterness work. Leave the rest for flavor and aroma.

 

Not to be a Repeating-Randy but, more flame out, definitely more flame out.

I like bittering with some super high AA hop like magnum at 60 minutes, get it to the desired IBU level(I like 60-75IBU max, and then making sure the beer finishes really dry 1.009-1.012) with the bittering. I personally like to split whatever blend of hops I am going to use for the aroma/flavor into 1/3rds. First 1/3rd goes in at 5 or 3 minutes. The second 1/3rd is a flameout/whirl-pool addition at 180F (with 15-20 minutes of whirlpooling). And the last 1/3rd for dry hops. Less dry hops and more flameout/whirlpool is a good choice as well.

 

An elderly fellow visits his doctor. This doctor specialises in Gastroenterology (stomach, gut, and similar).

"What seems to be the trouble?" the doctor asks.

"It's my farts," the man says. "My wife can't get to sleep at night because of the smell. Apparently, they're the 'silent but deadly kind'.

"How long has this been going on? Did it come on suddenly, or has it been going on for a while? Perhaps your diet is ..., er, ... ummm..." And the doctor's voice trails off.

"... Oh, my," the doctor continues. "That is not bad at all; hardly any aroma at all." (See the parallels, here?)

"I was hoping you wouldn't notice," the man replies. "That was one of my smaller 'silent' ones. Hardly worth mentioning, you know? I let these out all the time -- even in public.

"I see," says the doctor. "But I cannot help you. I'm referring you to my colleague."

"Is she a proctologist? A dietician?"

"No." The Doctor deadpans. "She's an Audiologist. You're profoundly deaf."

 

Raise the temp of your fermentor to at least 70F while dry hopping. I noticed a significant increase in aroma when I started setting the chamber at 70 instead of dry hopping in the low 60s.

 

Agree with the above .. that's way too much bittering hops. Here's my hop schedule from a random IPA I brew:
.5 oz - Nugget, Type: Pellet, AA: 14, Use: First Wort or @ 60, IBU: 13.9
1 oz - Citra, Type: Pellet, AA: 11, Use: Boil for 15 min, IBU: 17.9
1 oz - Mosaic, Type: Pellet, AA: 12.7, Use: Boil for 15 min, IBU: 20.67
1 oz - Citra, Type: Pellet, AA: 11, Use: Boil for 0 min
2 oz - Citra, Type: Pellet, AA: 11, Use: Dry Hop for 5 days

Think of hopping as constructing from the back of the tongue to the front:
60-30 min hop additions = bittering = back of tongue
30-15 min hop additions = mild bitter + aromatic = middle of the tongue
15-0 min hop additions = high aromatic + very little bitter = front of tongue
dryhop = all aroma = all nose

 

Here's an experiment -- just add 3/4 oz of something high alpha at 60, then nothing until flameout and the wort has dropped to around 190. At that point, turn off your chiller, add 3-4 oz of your favorite aroma hop, and insulate the pot. Let it sit for 45 minutes, then finish chilling and pitch. This always gets me massive hop flavor. When I do this I generally either dry hop or keg hop to keep the aroma up.

Another thought -- how much are you boiling? If you're not doing full volume boils, it's much harder to get high levels of hoppiness.

 

I dont enjoy a large amount of bitterness in my IPAs, but I love to saturate them with hop aroma and flavor. Here is a recent one I did. You should give the hopstand method I describe a try. Similar to the poster above. I PROMISE it'll get you what you're looking for
http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f69/re-balanced-ipa-496003/

Also, are you using hop muslin bags? When I first started, I would cram multiple OZs into a single bag and now I make sure to use larger socks to give the hops a lot of room after they have soaked up the water in teh kettle.

 

My latest was an extract DIPA consisting of hopped LME, 2 oz. Centennial, 1 oz. Cascade, 1 oz. Willamette, 1 oz. Amarillo. 3 days post-ferm, racked to secondary, DH'd 1 oz. Cascade, 1 oz. Amarillo (pellets) for 7 days. Cold-crashed/cleared 4 days. Bottle-conditioned 3 weeks @ 70F. Not exactly a W.C. or Pliny, but a really strong citrusy/hoppy aroma and a bitterness on the backside that makes you swallow twice.

 

I always do a hopstand/whirlpool with my IPAs. I usually use anywhere from 2-6 oz's for a 5 gallon batch just in the hopstand and let it sit at around 180 degrees for 15-30 minutes. If you want that resiny chewy hop flavor then that's what you need to do. It'll also give you a big hop nose too. Then dry hop with another 2 ounces for 5 days or so.

Those big IPAs aren't cheap to brew but they sure are fantastic to drink.

 

Me too! my last one had a whooping 8oz after flameout. Used a combination of hallertau blanc, pac gem, galaxy and huell melon. Its so different from any other IPA ive ever tried, flavor is totally berries and melons. I highly recommend the hallertau blanc and huell melon for those who are curious

 

Thanks all - definitely sounds like I've missed the boat on the late additions. I'll try the hopstand/whirlpool next time (never really done that). I always thought the fermentation stripped the aroma/flavor out of the hops, so I focused on the bittering mostly, then dry-hopped. But even my dry-hop sounds a little weak for what I want.
All good advice, thanks!

 

My first IPA I worked under this assumption that dry hop is where it's at for all the flavor and aroma. My mosaic/Citra red rye IPA came out nice and dry with rye spice and good 70 IBU bitterness, but the mosaic/Citra fruitiness and tropical citrus tones never came forward.

I started hearing and reading a LOT about late additions and whirlpool additions. I made a Bell's Hopslam clone as a birthday present for a friend and got it to the 120 IBUs with the bittering addition, and the rest (8oz) were all sub-5 minute additions, but no whirl pool and 3oz of dry hops. The hops were a bit muddled stilled but there was a big hoppy punch in the flavor and aroma.

Fast forward to my first extract ESB with fuggle and EKG hops. 1oz of fuggles at 60 that got me about 30IBUs and, 1oz each of fuggles and EKG at 5 which bumps another 8 IBU, and 1 oz each fuggles and EKG for a 170F Whirlpool for I think 15 minutes. The 2oz of EKG dry hops barely added anything as the whirlpool was evident in the hydrometer samples. This is fantastic, I'm not a big hop head but this guy is super tasty and I can't wait to apply what I've learned from these previous hoppy beers.

My next project will me an all cascade or all wakatu SMaSH. Mind you in all of these I have very very bland water, 19 chloride, 8.5 sulfate, high PH, but otherwise very bland water without messing with the water chemistry on my hoppy brews.

 

I have a Wakatu IPA dry hopping right now. I used all Wakatu hops for bittering and then Wakatu and Apollo for whirlpool and dry hop. Citrus and dank, should be a good one!

First Wort Hopping helps too with the bitterness additions. You can pull a little more flavor out of the 60/90 minute additions.

 

Thanks for starting this thread!

 

http://www.homebrewtalk.com/top-10-tips-super-hoppy-ipa.html

There is a thread as well out there as well