Hopping and Dry Hop question, IPA hop experiment batch 1.

[WhiteMtnHausBier]

I'm going to brew an extract/grain IPA tonight dubbed the 4x4 IPA, four malts, four hops.

Base malt is vienna @ 1lbs. I've got some other specialty stuff, crystal 7g, 2 row 7g, breiss caramel 7g 20ºL, and carapils 7g? Not totally sure on weights, I milled it all up last week and have since forgotten.

This is however my first real hop experiment as I've never really toyed with boil times/dry hopping and more then 3 hop varieties. What I have is 1oz Columbus 14AAU, 1oz Chinook 12 AAU, 1oz Cascade 6AAU, and Centennial 11AAU.

My idea was to split each 1oz bag into 4 - 7g piles, then combining 7g of each of the 4 hops, which makes a quantity of four 1oz bags, each containing 7g of each of the four hops.

Is combining the four varieties a bad idea? I plan to add two additions during the boil, one at flame out, and then one to dry hop with. Also what is the best way to dry hop in the primary, should I pour my wort over my hops (sitting ontop a filter/strainer)? Or should I put them in a hop back and put it into the primary? I actually took a rubber bung and inserted a stainless Ihook to tie the bag off too, is this a good idea? I'm worried about it clogging up the bottle neck during violent fermentation and not allowing sufficient Co2 exhaust.

I'm looking for a IPA with a hop forward, grapefruit/piney aroma. Slight amber in color (hence the base malt of Vienna and several grams of crystal malt. Please help. Thanks!

 

[Double_D]

I'm curious about the volume you plan to produce. Also, what kind of malt extract are you using? They already have character malts in there. Your name is already a misnomer as you have five character malts you're adding to your malt extract.

Palmer says this about vienna:
Vienna Malt 4 L This malt is lighter and sweeter than Munich malt and is a principal ingredient of Bock beers. Retains enough enzymatic power to convert itself but is often used with a base malt in the mash.

Are you steeping the grains or planning to do a mini mash?

Your hop schedule sounds good but I don't think you have enough there for the type of IPA I imagine you're looking for. I do mine similar to that but boil all my high AA hops for the whole boil then finish the hop additions between 20 and flame out, usually mixed. I dry hop for a week with the ones I want to accentuate the flavor of and finish for another week with one of everything again. I'd suggest fermenting completely then cold crashing followed by dry hoping. If you look around on here there's plenty of evidence to support that idea. Supposedly the yeast pulls the hop oils out of suspension but I can tell you from experience when I do it, it's better. If you have a bazooka screen you can wrap it in cheese cloth and it works well as a strainer but you'd have to transfer out of your carboy into a bucket first as you'll need to hold it with a piece of vinyl tube inside. That's the problem with dry hopping in a carboy(just my opinion, call me lazy if you like) you've got to move it more than once.

 

[HeavyKettleBrewing]

I'm curious about the volume you plan to produce. Also, what kind of malt extract are you using? They already have character malts in there. Your name is already a misnomer as you have five character malts you're adding to your malt extract.

I believe that carapils only contribution to this is head retention. I was wondering the same thing about the grain bill if only steeping or mini mash.

On your process, have you seen a noticeable difference when cold crashing and then racking/dry hopping to secondary? I have yet to cold crash when racking to secondary. Always cold crashed prior to bottling. I wonder if this would aid in my hop flavor/aroma???/ Hmmmm...

 

[Double_D]

It's good for the IPAs as far as I'm concerned. It seems like I get a better hop aroma/flavor that doesn't dissipate as quickly after a couple weeks in the keg aging. As for bitters and browns I just throw a little in there and let it sit for a week then cold crash. The crashing really helps it clear out faster IMO. I ferment in vittles vaults so it's easy for me to get in there and do what I need to do. I don't technically go to a secondary container just move the beer into the second phase of fermentation, i.e. dry hopping and aging. I know it's splitting hairs semantically, but I think it's a commonly held belief that the secondary has to be another vessel.

 

[WhiteMtnHausBier]

I believe I have breiss golden? And I see your point with the misnomer, the name was something that popped into my head this morning. I plan to do 5 gallons, extract with grains. I will steep in 3 gallons.

And to specify my grain bill is 1lbs vienna, 4oz Breiss caramel 40 (is this not the same as the LME?) 4oz breiss carapils and 4oz munich.

For extract I've got 3lbs of breiss DME and 3lbs of the breiss golden I believe.

Unfortunately I don't have a bazooka tube, could I weigh down the hop bag with a stainless weight?

 

[Double_D]

I was just talking about straining the hops out with the bazooka screen. You could put the hops in a bag and weigh it down with stainless but I think it would work better with whole cone hops vs pellets.

Your golden from Breiss is only base malt and carapils, but if you add munich and vienna you're back to 4.

 

[WhiteMtnHausBier]

Well brewing went great, i love the aroma of steeping hops! I have decided to wait a few days after initial fermentation begins to dry hop as recommended by my brewmaster at work. Broke my second thermometer, damn things are fragile.

 

[WhiteMtnHausBier]

Can you say caramel ipa?

 

[BrewMU]

Say it, write it down - I believe I could even drink it.

 

[WhiteMtnHausBier]

I was hoping for a more amber color. Seems to be clearing up too 6 days in. I want to rack into a secondary on Saturday (that will be 11 days in the primary, is that too long?).

 

[tagz]

11 days is definitely not too long. many people go longer with good results. 2-3 weeks gives the yeast time to clean up byproducts of fermentation that can lead to off flavors. you should be good to go. good luck!