Brewing a Pale Ale - suggest hops

[aceluby]

Per BJCP guidelines an APA should be between 30-45 ibu's. For my taste buds I find 35-40 ibu's is my happy zone, and where I try to target my pales. When I put the amount of hops you're suggesting, (most of them in the boil), into my recipe in Beersmith I get 127 theoretical ibu's. I don't care what yeast is used that's too far off the charts for me. But everyone has their own preferences, and if it works for you that's all that matters.

I get 1/2 that, but that’s likely due to my beer having a bigger malt backbone than your recipe. Even with that, the IBUs are mostly flavor/aroma - so the perception isn’t nearly what that calculator says. It’s less than my favorite IPAs, but the amount of hops in my recipe wasn’t really the point, it was more to show that citra by itself is a great option for a pale ale

 

[BongoYodeler]

I get 1/2 that, but that’s likely due to my beer having a bigger malt backbone than your recipe. Even with that, the IBUs are mostly flavor/aroma - so the perception isn’t nearly what that calculator says. It’s less than my favorite IPAs, but the amount of hops in my recipe wasn’t really the point, it was more to show that citra by itself is a great option for a pale ale

That I agree with!! Citra is an amazing hop that's great in both pales and ipa's.

 

[Lefou]

That I agree with!! Citra is an amazing hop that's great in both pales and ipa's.

One of my "tricks" when deciding what hops I'd theoretically use in a brew is to find a passably good commercial brew I like.

The wife - bless her heart - bought me a No Name pale ale strictly done with Citra. The best description I could give for Citra would be grapefruit and pine needles. In another instance, I asked her to buy a mixed case of Harpoon Rye IPA, Big League and Rec League, and the Bohemian Pilsner. I absolutely LOVED the bittering and aromas of the Big and Rec League beers.
Harpoon uses Citra, Mosaic, and Motueka and it works. I particularly like the Mosaic - it's a great hop, but if you do any sort of dry-hopping be prepared for some haze!

 

[BongoYodeler]

One of my "tricks" when deciding what hops I'd theoretically use in a brew is to find a passably good commercial brew I like.

The wife - bless her heart - bought me a No Name pale ale strictly done with Citra. The best description I could give for Citra would be grapefruit and pine needles. In another instance, I asked her to buy a mixed case of Harpoon Rye IPA, Big League and Rec League, and the Bohemian Pilsner. I absolutely LOVED the bittering and aromas of the Big and Rec League beers.
Harpoon uses Citra, Mosaic, and Motueka and it works. I particularly like the Mosaic - it's a great hop, but if you do any sort of dry-hopping be prepared for some haze!

Thanks. My vision for this is a tropical/fruity hazy pale ale. Still haven't brewed this yet, a bad cold followed by hurting my back keeps pushing my brew day out. I did pick up some Verdant yeast on Saturday and now plan to use that instead of Lutra.

 

[BongoYodeler]

Circling back. I finally brewed this hazy tropical pale ale a couple weeks ago and, after cold crashing, I dry hopped this evening. This is the first beer I've fermented in a corny keg and everything went according to plan. I took a hydrometer reading prior to moving the beer to the dry hop keg, and I hit my FG on the nose. The sample tasted really good and exactly what I was going for, and the color was spot on. My dry hop schedule will be for ~48 hours and then I'll move it to a serving keg and get it carb'd up.
*Edit: for the yeast I ended going with a packet of Verdant along with a packet of US-05 that was a year past it's expiration date.

This was the hop schedule I settled on for a total of 38.2 ibu's:
60 mins - Magnum .25oz 9.4 ibu's
00 mins - Citra LupoMax .75oz 20.3 ibu's
WP 20 mins @ 170° - El Dorado 1oz 3.6 ibu's
WP 20 mins @ 170° - Mosaic LupoMax 1oz 4.9 ibu's
DH 48 hrs Citra LupoMax .75oz 0 ibu's
DH 48 hrs Mosaic LupoMax .75oz 0 ibu's

No pics yet, but I'll take one once it's ready to serve.

 

[balrog]

I realize I am very late to this party but having used Voss Kveik several times, your comment

slight taste of an orange that's a bit past its prime

is pretty much what I get from Voss Kveik, Lalemand's dry, when I ferment at 95F. It is a real, pithy orange-adjacent but more tangerine-y, flavor, and it is the yeast.

 

[BongoYodeler]

I realize I am very late to this party but having used Voss Kveik several times, your comment

is pretty much what I get from Voss Kveik, Lalemand's dry, when I ferment at 95F. It is a real, pithy orange-adjacent but more tangerine-y, flavor, and it is the yeast.

Yeah, I've used it 2 or 3 times now, but mostly in an ipa where the hops seem to blend ok with it. In my wheat beer I thought I'd take advantage of the Voss orange by adding additional orange zest to compliment what I get from the yeast. As I said, initially it tasted really good, but then the orange flavor seemed to change into something less desirable. Unlike an ipa there isn't much for the Voss to hide behind in my American Wheat beer recipe.

 

[BongoYodeler]

Circling back. I finally brewed this hazy tropical pale ale a couple weeks ago and, after cold crashing, I dry hopped this evening. This is the first beer I've fermented in a corny keg and everything went according to plan. I took a hydrometer reading prior to moving the beer to the dry hop keg, and I hit my FG on the nose. The sample tasted really good and exactly what I was going for, and the color was spot on. My dry hop schedule will be for ~48 hours and then I'll move it to a serving keg and get it carb'd up.
*Edit: for the yeast I ended going with a packet of Verdant along with a packet of US-05 that was a year past it's expiration date.

This was the hop schedule I settled on for a total of 38.2 ibu's:
60 mins - Magnum .25oz 9.4 ibu's
00 mins - Citra LupoMax .75oz 20.3 ibu's
WP 20 mins @ 170° - El Dorado 1oz 3.6 ibu's
WP 20 mins @ 170° - Mosaic LupoMax 1oz 4.9 ibu's
DH 48 hrs Citra LupoMax .75oz 0 ibu's
DH 48 hrs Mosaic LupoMax .75oz 0 ibu's

No pics yet, but I'll take one once it's ready to serve.

First glass (other than small samples) of this beer - 1864 Pale Ale. Light and refreshing, 5.4%, with a little bit of a tropical flavor on the front and a nice grainy back end from the MO, Vienna, and Munich malts. This would be really good in the summer, but had I brewed it in the warmer months it wouldn't last long.