American IPA My 2-time gold winning American IPA

[hammis]

so i need two vials of the california ale then, gotcha! looking forwards to trying this stuff

 

[hammis]

so i brewed a batch last sunday, let it ferment for the last week or so and transfered it over to secondary (i filtered). I had a quick taste (pre-carbonation) and its a pretty hoppy beer, and really really tasty. Now i think mine may have turned out a little different than the original recipe due to some issues i had during my brew process, ie my kettle would fire up so i had to transfer back to my HLT, as a result i didnt have anything to filter out the trub prior to transferring to my fermenter and some hops made it in there. all in all it turned out pretty well, very drinkable. gonna let it sit and age now according to the recipe and let the flavours mellow out a bit. looking forwards to a cold one 2 weeks from now

 

[spiny_norman]

I brewed this yesterday. OG came in a little low (1.061) because I messed up my numbers calculating for a 60 minute boil and adjusting for equipment loss with my system. I'll let you know how it turns out in a month. Thanks for sharing your recipe

 

[spiny_norman]

I brewed this yesterday. OG came in a little low (1.061) because I messed up my numbers calculating for a 60 minute boil and adjusting for equipment loss with my system. I'll let you know how it turns out in a month. Thanks for sharing your recipe

One month later...

Just tapped the keg. This is a very, very good beer. Mine finished low at 1.010, even at a 62 degrees ferment. 6.7% abv. This is a nicely balanced, but dry IPA. I substituted the Chinook for Simcoe, as I couldn't find Chinook, and that worked very well.

 

[RichBenn]

I brewed this again (my first time doing a second on any recipes here), with some minor variations based upon what I had on hand. Am expecting good things (again!)

Rich

 

[Jalldredge]

What a great IPA recipe. Thank you so much for sharing it. I unfortunately only brewed 5 gallons of this incredible IPA because my 10 gallon Rubbermaid mash tun can't comfortably handle the grain required to make 10 gallons. Dang. Next time I'll do 7.5 gallons as the corny keg is getting light pretty quickly. The beer is a big hit with all of my friends.

I substituted Wyeast 1056 American Ale yeast with good results. I also made a yeast starter on a stir plate with 6 oz light DME to about 1800ml water.

 

[dallasdb]

Good ole Aurora, CO Tap.

Are you still in Aurora?

 

[enohcs]

Are you still in Aurora?

I moved to DC over a year ago. Way too few homebrewers out here.

 

[Sheldon]

Not many in DC, most are in VA and Maryland. The serious brewers (and I am not as good or serious as them) belong to BURP.

Sheldon

 

[dougmaher434]

Hey sorry for the newb question, but what would be the extract recipe for this? Does anyone know? Or partial mash. I love IPAs would like to do a similar recipe but I am not ready for all-grain yet. I just brewed my first batch, don't know how it turned out yet. Looking for recipes for my second batch. Thanks so much.

 

[br1dge]

Doug - get a copy of beersmith, load the recipe as written, then "convert" to extract. Its pretty simple to do. Doing this will really help you understand a lot about the process. We just brewed this weekend before last, doing All Grain - hope it turns out as good as we think it will based on the feedback. Good luck and happy brewing

 

[dougmaher434]

Hey thank you for the valuable information. I really appreciate it.

 

[diatonic]

Wow, this looks like a really good beer. I'm going to brew it next week. I'm scaling it up to 11 gallons to try to finish with 10 gallons after dry hopping and equipment losses. I'm going to ferment half of it with WLP001, and the other half with the new WLP090 San Diego Super Yeast.

Thanks for what looks like an awesome recipe.

 

[RobWalker]

Sorry for a repeat question, but I don't have access to Beersmith this week as I'm not at home. Can I use LME instead of the 2 Row? If so, I'm off to the home brew store soon...

 

[kapbrew13]

Sorry for a repeat question, but I don't have access to Beersmith this week as I'm not at home. Can I use LME instead of the 2 Row? If so, I'm off to the home brew store soon...

You didn't take your computer but you have your boil kettle? Nice.

 

[RichBenn]

I'm going to ferment half of it with WLP001, and the other half with the new WLP090 San Diego Super Yeast.

Great idea! Please remember to post back here with your results! Sounds like a great experiment!

 

[dale1038]

Brewed this up today. Have some Willamette I wanted to use up and this looked good. Hit all my numbers. I'll post back with the results. Cheers!

 

[isurf]

brewed this last night, gravity sample tasted awsome!

 

[Shawn_John]

Hi everyone, new to AG, in fact still a virgin. Extract about 9 times, making my MLT and HLT this weekend and looking at my first batch of AG in a week or so.

I am searching recipes and saw this, just wondering why the 90 min boil? Is that normal with AG? hadnt noticed it in other recipes.

Thanks in advance, also I'm a big fan, been reading the forums for over a year learning everything I can about this hobby/obsession!

 

[diatonic]

90 minute boils are fairly common, though it probably depends on the brewer. I do a 90 minute boil any time I use a lot of pilsen malt to drive off SMM/DMS, or when I do a light beer (seems to help round out the flavors.) 90 minute boils can help improve efficiency by starting at a lower pre-boil gravity. My efficiency is best in low OG beers (90-93%). I'll do a 90 minute boil any time a recipe calls for it, or if I'm targeting a really high OG. YMMV, you could likely get away with a 60 minute boil with this recipe.

 

[SpaceJunk]

Mash at 154 for 60min. I had 70%eff
American Rahr (2 row) Pale: 11.50lbs
American Briess Crystal 20 1.00lbs
American Briess Light Munich 0.75lbs
American Briess Carapils 0.75lbs
American Briess Torrified Wheat 0.25lbs

Chinook (Pellet) 1oz 30min
Cascade (Pellet) 1.5oz 30min
Williamette (Pellet) 0.5oz 15min
Cascade (Pellet) 1.5oz 15min
Williamette (Pellet) 1oz 5min
Cascade (Pellet) 2oz Dry in secondary

Don't worry about the lack of a 60minute hop addition. The bitterness is spot on.

This IPA won gold in the IBU challenge at the IBU Open in Iowa earlier this year and gold at 8 Seconds of Froth a few months ago.

If you brew, let me know what you think.

I brewed this beer and it turned out great, very drinkable. I have to admit though that being new to brewing and wanting more to experiment rather then be true to style (which will surely gain some frowns), I bastardized this recipe a bit. First I lowered the IBU's some, I used Maris Otter in place of the pale malt, did a seven day dry hop with Citra and now have a wet hop of Cascade sitting in the keg with this beer. Sorry I did not give this recipe a try the way you meant it to be brewed but having had similar beers in the past I felt I wanted to try something I knew I had never tasted before. Thanks for posting this recipe so that people like me can have a baseline with which to experiment!

 

[dougmaher434]

I just brewed an extract version of this beer. It turned out pretty good by the gravity turned out lower than I expected 1.060.
Grain:
9lb. Pale Malt Extract
4 oz. Wheat Malt Extract
Specialty Grains:
1 lb. Carapils
Hops:
30 Minute: 1.5 oz. Chinook, 2 oz. Cascades.
15 Minute: 2 oz. Cascade, 1 oz. Willamette
5 Minute: 1 oz. Willamette.
I will dry hop 14 days with 2 oz. Cascades

I used a starter of White Labs San Diego Super Yeast.

I almost decided to replace Willamette with Citra hops but couldn't find em' at my organic Homebrew store.

It's fermenting like crazy at 67 degrees.

 

[enohcs]

It's been a few years since I made this. Tis the season for a killer ipa. It's official...I'm making this one this weekend.

 

[dale1038]

It's been a few years since I made this. Tis the season for a killer ipa. It's official...I'm making this one this weekend.

Yeah, this beer is awesome! Thanks for the recipe. Some variation of this will be my house IPA.

I had to mash at 151 to get it to attenuate. I love the balance of hops in this beer. I think the Willamette lends a nice earthy quality to balance with the Cascades. Nice and dry as well with no annoying sweetness that is so common with today's commercial IPA's. This is like a throwback IPA that reminds me of why I home brew.

Don't hesitate to brew this guys! Cheers!

 

[Canadabrew]

I have cascade on hand and willamette but no chinook.. Could I get away with using something else?
I have centennial, galaxy, EKG as well...

 

[jgarretson]

Is the torrified wheat for head retention?

 

[dmbryan]

Brewed up 5 gallons. It is chugging away as we speak. Smells like a great one. Thanks for the recipe.

 

[BBL_Brewer]

I have a question for you enohcs. Why do a 90 minute boil if your not going to start adding hops until the last 30 minutes? Unless your using a lot of sparge water to raise your efficiency and have to boil it off, seems unecessary. Not knocking your recipe, just curious. I'm thinking about brewing a batch of this but would like to just do a 30 minute boil and be done with it.

 

[RichBenn]

I've done 60 minute boils on this recipe- it's fine. One of my favorites.

Other than efficiency, I've heard 90 minute boils help caramelization. There are other reasons, but I'll leave that for others.

 

[enohcs]

I have a question for you enohcs. Why do a 90 minute boil if your not going to start adding hops until the last 30 minutes? Unless your using a lot of sparge water to raise your efficiency and have to boil it off, seems unecessary. Not knocking your recipe, just curious. I'm thinking about brewing a batch of this but would like to just do a 30 minute boil and be done with it.

I do 90 minute boils on all my beers out of habit. 60 min should be fine.

For added kick, try moving some of the 30min additions to first wort additions and boil for 60 min. You'll get some fantastic flavor without a harsh 60 minute bitterness.