Extremely Watery IPA - Dogfish Head 60min Clone

[minger]

Hi guys, I was extremely stoked last night. I made a Dogfish Head 60min IPA clone a while back (at work, will post recipe later if needed). I had it a week in the fermenter, two in the secondary while dry hopping. Since I was out of town last week, it sat in the bottles for 4 weeks, and chilled for two days. It should have been perfect.

I took a bottle out of the fridge and let rest for a few minutes. I poured a rich reddish amber-brown with slight head. It looked perfect. I took a drink of what was going to be the start of a delicious two weeks of beer supply.

But it was watery as hell. It had great taste, and in the background I could taste all of the 3oz of floral hoppy deliciousness, but it had no mouthfeel. It almost felt like a slightly better tasting average american light lager, but maybe even more watery.

I can't really tell where I went wrong, but does anyone have any suggestions? I mean hell, this batch cost like $60, so if I do another IPA I certainly expect better results.

Thanks guys,

 

[JohnnyO]

Being a noob who has only done two batches, take my words with a grain of salt unless someone else confirms it.

I think you racked to secondary a little prematurely. A week seems a little too soon to take an IPA off the yeast cake.

 

[RedIrocZ-28]

Gonna need the recipe before anything can even be debated.

And a week in primary is usually too short of a time. Not that its going to make your beer taste watery, but yeast still have work to do for a few weeks after primary (active) fermentation action has ceased.

 

[Indy418]

Also... did you hit your temps right?

 

[RICLARK]

Gonna need the recipe before anything can even be debated.

+1 Post the recipe.

 

[bull8042]

Hold on folks. Let's back up and look at the recipe before we start taking wild stabs at anything.
Was this Yooper's recipe or one you found somewhere else?

 

[Smurfe]

Yup, need the recipe. Actually a week in primary and 2 week in secondary sounds about right to me. Most of my brews just sit 2 weeks in primary and thats it. My guess from the little info here is maybe too low carbonation leading to the watery mouthfeel.

 

[steelerguy]

Too little time in primary would not cause the beer to be too watery. If anything, it would have given it more mouthfeel because of less sugars being processed. (Although it just would have finished in secondary)

Need recipe to see if it was extract or grain (guessing extract based on price) and the OG and FG.

 

[minger]

Sorry guys, I should have waited until I got home, I was just so damn frustrated. Anyways, here it is slightly modified (as noted) from The Best of Brew Your Own magazine "150 Classic Clone Recipes".

1.5lb 15oz 2-row pale malt
6.4oz Amber Malt
5.0lb Light LME
2.5lb Light LME
0.70oz (11.2 AAU) Nugget (substituted for Warrior) hops
0.28oz (3.6 AAU) Simcoe hops
0.70oz (5.6 AAU) Tradition (substituted for Palisade) hops
1tsp Irish Moss (at 15 min)
0.70oz Tradition (substituted for Palisade) whirlpool hops
0.59oz each of Cascade (sub for Amarillo), Simcoe, and Glacier hops for dry hopping

I did a partial-mash (I think) that went like this:

Steep 1.5lb 2-row and 6.4oz Amber malt at 152 in 2.25qr water for 45 min. Rinse with 1qt at 170. Add water to make 4gal.

Stir in 4.0lb Light dried malt extract (I used 5.0lb liquid malt extract). The hopping schedule was supposed to be done with a steady-stream from a hopper, so I just tried my best to keep a constant stream of hops going in.

At 15min left, stir in remaining 2.0lb 15oz (I used 2.5lb maybe?) of LME. Basically at 0min I added whirlpool hops and cooled quickly. I transferred to primary and let sit for one week. Then I racked to secondary for two weeks and added dry hops. Then I primed with 3/4c of sugar and bottled for 4 weeks.

To be quite honest, I think I forgot to take a FG reading, but I guess I ASSumed that after three weeks total fermenting, that it would be done (I know, I know). Other than that, I think I kept everything pretty textbook (from my one other batch of experience).

Any ideas?

 

[RedIrocZ-28]

Um... did you crush the 2 row and Amber malt? You said you steeped it. I do believe that it needs to be crushed for anything to come out of it.

Ok, beyond that ^^^ I got nothing....

 

[minger]

The guy at the brew store crushes all the grains for his customers.

 

[G-E-R-M-A-N]

To be quite honest, I think I forgot to take a FG reading,

I think this can be part of the problem. Your dealing with not knowing what the O.G. was from the beginning. Also what was your volume in the fermenter after chilling?

These are questions I would be asking myself to find out what went wrong.

I have screwed up a couple batches from incorrect volume amt's/missing O.G. so far, so dont feel bad.

 

[s3n8]

I bet it will be a lot better in a couple weeks. 6 weeks for a moderate to high gravity brew is pretty quick. Do yourself a favor and let it age a bit and I guarantee it will be better.

 

[minger]

Your dealing with not knowing what the O.G. was from the beginning.

I took an OG reading it and was right in where it should have been. I figured there was no point posting an FG since I didn't have the OG.

Also what was your volume in the fermenter after chilling?

Directly after I took off the the boil it was probably 2.75gal. After chilling I filled to 5gal.

I guess I'll wait unless anyone else has some suggestions.

 

[G-E-R-M-A-N]

I took an OG reading it and was right in where it should have been. I figured there was no point posting an FG since I didn't have the OG.


Directly after I took off the the boil it was probably 2.75gal. After chilling I filled to 5gal.

I guess I'll wait unless anyone else has some suggestions.

I am sorry I guess I misread your post.

 

[homebrewjapan]

I use between 7-7.5lbs of DME when I'm making an extract recipe.
The equivalent LME would be 8.4-9 (I think). You used 7.5kgs, so one has to hope that your mash made up the rest otherwise the beer could come out watery. You possibly want to double check any conversions that you made (eg between DME and LME).

One more thing: Are you using UK or US gallons? My bucket has gallons written on the side but they are UK gallons. Big difference. I made that mistake recently:
Ooops « Homebrew Japan

 

[minger]

I plugged it into Beersmith and the numbers looked OK. In fact, even my OG was on (~1.064 IIRC).

 

[bhughes]

Even if it's not as much extract as you were hoping, that is plenty to make a good beer. You said it didn't have much fizz, it just sounds like it hasn't fully carbonated yet. My last IPA took a good month to carb right, and it was even better 2 weeks after that. I think the higher gravity may take a bit longer to carb, and since you moved to a secondary, it may not be as much yeast in the bottles so it's taking longer.
Let it sit another few weeks. I would recommend at least 2 more ounces of hops for a good IPA though, preferably 6 or 7 ounces, but I like my hops.

 

[minger]

It tastes properly carbonated, but based on all the suggestions, I'll just try it again in a week, and if it's not decent, then another and..........

thanks again guys,

 

[pompeiisneaks]

The times I've had "watered down" tasting beers, have been because I didn't hit OG and didn't top off w/ any LME/DME. But since you said you did hit it, I'm kinda at a loss... Very weird indeed.

 

[Crucial-BBQ]

My first AG brew had the same 'problem', after two weeks in bottles it tasted great but was totally watery (no mouth feel). It was also flat as heck. I let it sit for two more weeks and it gained some body and carbonation. Another two weeks and it now feels nice and 'full'.

So, give it some time and see what happens.