How do I not get that vegitative green taste in my IPAs?

[Ricand]

I'm a seasoned homebrewer. I've won Gold for my DIPA at Beervana. I hate my IPAs. They always seem to have a very green vegetative finish to them that commercial IPAs don't seem to have. I've varied my dry hopping from a week to only 3 days. None of them have the clean crisp hop finish to them. I have Denny Conns Wry Smile IPA on tap now and it just doesn't have the clean finish of a commercial IPA. Is it because the commercial guys mostly use hop oils instead of raw hops? Anybody else have this problem?

 

[masskrug]

Have you tried different yeast strains?

 

[TriggerFingers]

Sounds like two different issues. First, is the vegetative aspect. Second, the crispness. I have found vegetative qualities from a couple of IPA's early on--the type of hops, quantity, and time all play a role. So if you have time figured out, then think about quantity and type--more will give you more green. Also, do you do everything in primary or secondary?

For the crispness add 1tsp of Gypsum to you IPA's to start to adjust your water. I have found that my hoppy beers seemed flat until trying this--now they are great!

 

[Ricand]

Have you tried different yeast strains?

Yes, wet and dry yeasts. I tend to do US05 on most stuff. However, I've used a number of different wet yeasts.

 

[Ricand]

Sounds like two different issues. First, is the vegetative aspect. Second, the crispness. I have found vegetative qualities from a couple of IPA's early on--the type of hops, quantity, and time all play a role. So if you have time figured out, then think about quantity and type--more will give you more green. Also, do you do everything in primary or secondary?

For the crispness add 1tsp of Gypsum to you IPA's to start to adjust your water. I have found that my hoppy beers seemed flat until trying this--now they are great!

I'm seasoned. I have an RO water system that I can get 20gal of RO for each brew and I build my liquor. I do 1/2 barrel batches on a two pump brew sculpture with triple PID controllers. I've tried a number of hop enhancing liquor profiles on my IPAs. I've used my own home grown hops and commercial hops. Hasn't really helped the problem. I have 8 taps on my main 8' BevAir keezer and 2 taps on a side Perlick keezer. Can you use massive amounts of hops in an IPA and not get the 'homebrew' IPA green finishes that do not occur in commercial IPAs? This is really bugging me. I go 'brewsing' with a friend where we cruise the Northern California commercial brewpubs and are fortunate to taste some of the best West Coast IPAs out there in my opinion. I live 6 miles from Russian River and Vinnie. I just can't seem to brew them. Do I need a commercial source of hop oils? Should I try some 'blasting' to extract the oils from my hops and use them without the green parts? I just want to fix this, any help is appreciated. Also, if you can convince me you have a BJCP palette I will send you a bottle of this RIPA. I will trade with someone who thinks their homebrew IPA doesn't have the green flavors and are using whole or pellet hop too.

Check out my brewery in the sig.

 

[max384]

Do your customers complain about the same tastes you describe? Is it possible that you're being your own worst critic?

I never noticed these tastes you describe in my homebrew IPAs, and I don't do anything special. I never heard of this to be a common problem with homebrew IPAs. Is it?

 

[Ricand]

Do your customers complain about the same tastes you describe? Is it possible that you're being your own worst critic?

I never noticed these tastes you describe in my homebrew IPAs, and I don't do anything special. I never heard of this to be a common problem with homebrew IPAs. Is it?

Thank you for this post. We don't have 'customers' since this is just something we do for our friends and family. I am very critical of beers in general and my homebrews in particular. Our house beers have been tweaked over 100's of gallons of brewing. I'm always thinking about how each one could be better for my palette. It's what make homebrewing so much fun. You can brew the best beers for you. All my other beers are spot on and IMO the best of the genre. I have Dos Chichies on tap. It's a Mexican vienna lager that is better than can be bought, IMO again. It's a cross between Dos Equis and Tecate. I'm very happy with it. Our Red Lyon ale is better than most amber ales again IMO. I just can't seem to get an IPA that I like.

 

[sandyeggoxj]

What are the specific water profiles you have tried? I'm looking for actual mg/l values. What is your pH doing for the hoppy brews? Are you employing hopping practices such as fwh? Are you dry hopping with pellet or whole cone? Are you flushing with co2 excessively?

My experience is that the best west coast IPA is ready about 3-4 weeks from brew day, is in an o2 free environment, is dry hopped at around 1oz per gallon for a week or less and has high sulfates ~300ppm.

 

[Ricand]

What are the specific water profiles you have tried? I'm looking for actual mg/l values. What is your pH doing for the hoppy brews? Are you employing hopping practices such as fwh? Are you dry hopping with pellet or whole cone? Are you flushing with co2 excessively?

My experience is that the best west coast IPA is ready about 3-4 weeks from brew day, is in an o2 free environment, is dry hopped at around 1oz per gallon for a week or less and has high sulfates ~300ppm.

Hahaa.. ok. Let's look at the notes on the RIPA. Perhaps this one didn't have the 300ppm, I believe I did try that range though. I think the Sulphate:Chloride ratio is more important than a set sulphate concentration for hop presence. The profile on this one was CA 86, Mg 3, S04 161 Cl 42. Alkalinity was at 47. I keep my Hanna pH meter well calibrated and believe the 5.3 temp adjusted on the initial mash so I didn't adjust. This 15 gal brew had 3 oz of Mt. Hood as a FWH, some Columbus and more Mt hood during the boil. It finished with 3oz of Columbus in the secondary. I won't use pellets, I really like whole flowers as fresh as I can get. I use good fermentation practices. I inject O2 at pitch and have the conical well temp controlled. I fermented this at 64 which is a little chilly for USO5, but it makes a very clean almost mineraly yeast profile. There are no defects beyond the grassy flavors that I can detect. Do you have a bottle of your IPA you'd like to swap? If so, PM me your address and I'll bottle up this Rye Smile Denny Conn IPA and send it your way to see what you think. You seem to know what you are doing and I'd value your input.

 

[brettg20]

I'm assuming your hops are fresh and stored airtight in a freezer?

 

[Ricand]

I'm assuming your hops are fresh and stored airtight in a freezer?

You are right. I have a small freezer in the brewery specifically to store my hops. Not all, but my common hops I vacuum pack in portions. Others I double bag in zip locks and squeeze the air out. I try to discard my hops annually when the new crop comes in, even if they are from my own hop yard. My first thought about this problem was old hops.

I just want to brew a clean IPA like Heroine, No Hopologies or even Lagunitas IPA. I've heard they use oils. Does anyone know of a commercial IPA that uses all whole/pellet hops instead of hop oils?

 

[dbsmith]

From my own beers, I've noticed that taste especially when I have a lot of mid-addition/flavor hops. Now, I now try to use a very high alpha-acid hop in a modest quantity as my backbone bitterness hop at ~60min, and throw in some aroma hops around flameout time. I also try to avoid pelletized hops, as I read that crushing the hops can leak out grassy flavors (though I have not tested this hypothesis). Never experimented with water manipulations. Good luck!

 

[kaconga]

You are right. I have a small freezer in the brewery specifically to store my hops. Not all, but my common hops I vacuum pack in portions. Others I double bag in zip locks and squeeze the air out. I try to discard my hops annually when the new crop comes in, even if they are from my own hop yard. My first thought about this problem was old hops.

I just want to brew a clean IPA like Heroine, No Hopologies or even Lagunitas IPA. I've heard they use oils. Does anyone know of a commercial IPA that uses all whole/pellet hops instead of hop oils?

Torpedo is brewed with purely whole leaf hops. It is made by sierra Nevada. If you want a clean IPA then I would recommend doing a simple hop bill. Something like 60, 20, 10, 0 and dry hop. Do an oz at each addition and see what kind of flavors you get. Vegetative is most likely from having too much hop matter in the beer. That was a big reason RR uses hop extract in PtE.

 

[sandyeggoxj]

Hahaa.. ok. Let's look at the notes on the RIPA. Perhaps this one didn't have the 300ppm, I believe I did try that range though. I think the Sulphate:Chloride ratio is more important than a set sulphate concentration for hop presence. The profile on this one was CA 86, Mg 3, S04 161 Cl 42. Alkalinity was at 47. I keep my Hanna pH meter well calibrated and believe the 5.3 temp adjusted on the initial mash so I didn't adjust. This 15 gal brew had 3 oz of Mt. Hood as a FWH, some Columbus and more Mt hood during the boil. It finished with 3oz of Columbus in the secondary. I won't use pellets, I really like whole flowers as fresh as I can get. I use good fermentation practices. I inject O2 at pitch and have the conical well temp controlled. I fermented this at 64 which is a little chilly for USO5, but it makes a very clean almost mineraly yeast profile. There are no defects beyond the grassy flavors that I can detect. Do you have a bottle of your IPA you'd like to swap? If so, PM me your address and I'll bottle up this Rye Smile Denny Conn IPA and send it your way to see what you think. You seem to know what you are doing and I'd value your input.

I'd love to swap but I just served 10 gallons of my IPA at a wedding in a couple hours. People were pretty upset that it ran out! I'll be brewing some more soon but I'm in the middle of moving and it will take a little bit to get up and running. I'll pm you once I can swap. It will likely be a month maybe a little more.

I target my sulfate at 300, chloride around 50 and calcium around 140. My total hardness is around 360 and alk around 90. The problem is that these numbers aren't very accurate. I'm using carbon filtered city water and the city doesn't have very good data on its water.

The other difference is that I am using as much hops in a 10 gallon batch as you are for 15. All pellet. All high alpha. Warrior, Columbus, Chinook simcoe. I was dry hopping with whole cone Amarillo because I got a bunch for free. I'm going to change the dry hop to something else. Maybe centennial.

If you were to try pellets try t45 pellets. Less vegetal matter and more lupulin per weight unit.

 

[Adaman05]

Those breweries are using hop extract, yes, but they are using pellet hops too. Usually the hop oil is used for bittering. I've used almost exclusively pellet hops, and with my IPAs I do massive hopstands and large dry hops in a CO2 purged keg. I don't think the hops are your issue.