New England IPA "Northeast" style IPA

[beervoid]

Think I found part of the answer in the book yeast.

"The one nutrient that yeast need, which is not present in wort due to boiling, is oxygen. During the lag phase, yeast cells rapidly absorb available oxygen from the wort. The cells need oxygen in order to produce important compounds, most significantly sterols, which are critical in yeast membrane permeability. It is important that you provide enough oxygen to the yeast at the beginning of fermentation. Generally, you do not want to add oxygen later, as it can disturb the delicate balance of flavor and aroma compound creation. One exception is when brewing very high-gravity, high-alcohol beers. In those cases, where the yeast need large reserves to ferment the beer to completion, a second addition of oxygen between 12 and 18 hours after pitching can make a tremendous difference in attenuating the beer to the desired level."

Big breweries handle this by automatic on-line monitoring but at a home level splashing about and stirring is probably enough for what we need. Oxygen is essential in the lag phase to allow some of the yeast to grow whilst other yeast is actually fermenting. Insufficent healthy yeast will drive the mechanism down a different pathway and you got all sorts of off flavours."

From what I can conclude its detrimental but it doesnt say if yeast will absorb/use oxygen later in the process.

 

[jakturner]

faak. Hate this style. Even under CO2 pressure got oxidized in 2 weeks. Going back to wcipas..

Have you tried fermenting in a keg with a floating dip tube and serving from that same keg? Some people knock it but it’s done wonders for my NEIPAs. Just make sure you are transferring the cleanest wort possible to the keg, do only one dryhop day 3 and spund or cap, put in fridge day 9-10. Never had grassy vegital flavors. Use Kveik yeast and you can cut the time down to 5 days grain to glass. Worth a try, and you can use your fermonster dip tube in your keg and not have to purchase anything extra.

 

[couchsending]

Eliminating o2 exposure is definitely critical however adding dry hops into a beer that’s full of yeast can have some serious negatives consequences as well.

Don’t get me wrong I’m definitely o2 averse on both the hot and cold side however listen to any great brewer of hoppy beers and they will all tell you that removing as much yeast from the beer before adding dry hops is paramount in getting the most flavor and especially aroma out of your hops.

Obviously the key is to try to eliminate o2 as much as possible while doing so which on the Homebrew scale can be difficult especially if you don’t have a concical that can at least maintain a bit of head pressure.

Almost all my dry hop additions are done after fermentation and performed by dumping them in the top through a 1.5” TC opening. Ideally while pumping Co2 into the headspace but even then I haven’t found that to be all that critical. I’ll purge the headspace a few times and leave the hops there for varying amounts of time before crashing as low as I can go while maintaining head pressure and close transfer to a keg that was purged using the lodo method. Aroma explodes from the glass and it doesn’t fade for up to 2 months in the keg. (They don’t last that long usually). Most heavily hopped beers are 21-24 days total time before consumption and even then take a few weeks to really shine in my opinion.

These methods result in better beer than I ever made when I was dry hopping during fermentation and /or spunding in a keg.

Not saying controlling o2 exposure isn’t super critical but yeast will drag down lots of the good stuff when it floccs and can result in a less impactful hoppy beer in the long run as welll.

 

[Dgallo]

Eliminating o2 exposure is definitely critical however adding dry hops into a beer that’s full of yeast can have some serious negatives consequences as well.

Don’t get me wrong I’m definitely o2 averse on both the hot and cold side however listen to any great brewer of hoppy beers and they will all tell you that removing as much yeast from the beer before adding dry hops is paramount in getting the most flavor and especially aroma out of your hops.

Obviously the key is to try to eliminate o2 as much as possible while doing so which on the Homebrew scale can be difficult especially if you don’t have a concical that can at least maintain a bit of head pressure.

Almost all my dry hop additions are done after fermentation and performed by dumping them in the top through a 1.5” TC opening. Ideally while pumping Co2 into the headspace but even then I haven’t found that to be all that critical. I’ll purge the headspace a few times and leave the hops there for varying amounts of time before crashing as low as I can go while maintaining head pressure and close transfer to a keg that was purged using the lodo method. Aroma explodes from the glass and it doesn’t fade for up to 2 months in the keg. (They don’t last that long usually). Most heavily hopped beers are 21-24 days total time before consumption and even then take a few weeks to really shine in my opinion.

These methods result in better beer than I ever made when I was dry hopping during fermentation and /or spunding in a keg.

Not saying controlling o2 exposure isn’t super critical but yeast will drag down lots of the good stuff when it floccs and can result in a less impactful hoppy beer in the long run as welll.

I believe that’s where I’ve been picking up my oxygen, during my soft crash for the yeast drop. Have a new method that should do the trick to prevent the o2 contact

 

[plazola86]

Saw that rig for sale on aliexpress. How does it do at low pressures?

It works good so far. This style of spunding valve should work better at low pressure from what I've read. I have mine set to about 3-4 PSI.

 

[cheesebach]

I've been struggling a bit with some inconsistency in the hop aroma & flavor in my NEIPAs, that I strongly suspect is a result of either the timing of the dry hop and/or spunding to naturally carbonate. The two issues I seem to struggle with are "hop burn" which doesn't dissipate with time and a dull/muted hop flavor and aroma (despite a 1+ oz/gallon dry hop).

With all the focus on avoiding O2 exposure in this style, I've tended to tweak my dry hop and spunding process a little with each batch, and I'm beginning to suspect some of these tweaks I've made to keep out O2 may actually be doing more harm than good. Some of my worst batches have been the ones that I add a single, large dry hop at the tail end of fermentation (usually at 48 hours post-pitch), and then at the same time, replace the blow off tube with a spunding valve and let the pressure rise to ~20-25psi to carbonate in the fermenting keg. Anyways, I decided it was time for me to test some of these variables in split batches to try to understand where I was going wrong.

Based on some of the recent discussion in this thread, I decided first up should be the dry hop experiment. I split my wort from the BK into 2 kegs for fermentation - one would be dry hopped once at around 1.020 - 1.025 SG (which happened 40hrs post-pitch) and the other would be dry hopped after fermentation and chilling down to 60F to help drop the yeast out. I'll update with more details and results after I've given both batches some time to settle and carbonate, but one thing I noticed from the post fermentation samples (which I had already suspected, given that we know several of the commercial brewers are not hopping until post-fermentation), was that the post-fermentation dry hop beer already had most or all of the characteristic haze despite not having received any dry hop additions yet.

The picture attached is the hydrometer sample from the post-fermentation dry hop batch, 8 days after pitch, before any dry hop additions. The beer hasn't seen any hop additions after the whirlpool at 155F. Granted, it hasn't been chilled to serving temps yet, but with a highly flocculent yeast like 1318, I'd expect most of the yeast should have settled out after a week of fermentation and a couple days at 60F. Just figured I'd share this data point as something to consider in the seemingly never-ending debate over what exactly it is that creates the haze in this style.

 

[ThirstyPawsHB]

Have you tried fermenting in a keg with a floating dip tube and serving from that same keg? Some people knock it but it’s done wonders for my NEIPAs. Just make sure you are transferring the cleanest wort possible to the keg, do only one dryhop day 3 and spund or cap, put in fridge day 9-10. Never had grassy vegital flavors. Use Kveik yeast and you can cut the time down to 5 days grain to glass. Worth a try, and you can use your fermonster dip tube in your keg and not have to purchase anything extra.

I use a Fermentasaurous which is exactly that with the ability to dump trub. Humm, just thought of something. I actually dumped about 4 times. That would actually be a large source of air...think I found the problem. Maybe Ill just stick a bucket under it and dump pressurized next time.

 

[tld6008]

I use a Fermentasaurous which is exactly that with the ability to dump trub. Humm, just thought of something. I actually dumped about 4 times. That would actually be a large source of air...think I found the problem. Maybe Ill just stick a bucket under it and dump pressurized next time.

Try without dumping

 

[hezagenius]

Here's my latest iteration. I used Hornindal and fermented at 85F for 7 days. No dry hopping or spunding at all during the fermentation. After fermentation, I slowly crashed for I think 5 days down to about 42F. Then pressure transferred into a purged keg with dry hops already in it. I let it rise to room temp and did a dry hop for about 5 days total. Then did another pressure transfer to the serving keg where it's been chilling and carbing.

I wanted to try a kveik yeast because they are supposedly non-phenolic and I've been wondering if some off-flavors I've been experiencing were due to them. I also wanted to skip the biotransformation addition and rack off the yeast before dry hopping since my aromas and flavors have been lacking, in my opinion. This beer is probably the smoothest NEIPA I've ever made. Basically no bitterness or acridity from hop particles. There aren't any weird off flavors that I can detect. The aroma is mostly peaches. I would say I was expecting to get a little more citrus flavor than what I ended up with considering I used Citra and Galaxy but I have a few ideas for the next batch to see if they work. I did 8oz of hops in a low-temp whirlpool for I think 30 minutes and then 8oz of dry hops post-fermentation.

 

[marchuk96]

I've been struggling a bit with some inconsistency in the hop aroma & flavor in my NEIPAs, that I strongly suspect is a result of either the timing of the dry hop and/or spunding to naturally carbonate. The two issues I seem to struggle with are "hop burn" which doesn't dissipate with time and a dull/muted hop flavor and aroma (despite a 1+ oz/gallon dry hop).

With all the focus on avoiding O2 exposure in this style, I've tended to tweak my dry hop and spunding process a little with each batch, and I'm beginning to suspect some of these tweaks I've made to keep out O2 may actually be doing more harm than good. Some of my worst batches have been the ones that I add a single, large dry hop at the tail end of fermentation (usually at 48 hours post-pitch), and then at the same time, replace the blow off tube with a spunding valve and let the pressure rise to ~20-25psi to carbonate in the fermenting keg. Anyways, I decided it was time for me to test some of these variables in split batches to try to understand where I was going wrong.

Based on some of the recent discussion in this thread, I decided first up should be the dry hop experiment. I split my wort from the BK into 2 kegs for fermentation - one would be dry hopped once at around 1.020 - 1.025 SG (which happened 40hrs post-pitch) and the other would be dry hopped after fermentation and chilling down to 60F to help drop the yeast out. I'll update with more details and results after I've given both batches some time to settle and carbonate, but one thing I noticed from the post fermentation samples (which I had already suspected, given that we know several of the commercial brewers are not hopping until post-fermentation), was that the post-fermentation dry hop beer already had most or all of the characteristic haze despite not having received any dry hop additions yet.

The picture attached is the hydrometer sample from the post-fermentation dry hop batch, 8 days after pitch, before any dry hop additions. The beer hasn't seen any hop additions after the whirlpool at 155F. Granted, it hasn't been chilled to serving temps yet, but with a highly flocculent yeast like 1318, I'd expect most of the yeast should have settled out after a week of fermentation and a couple days at 60F. Just figured I'd share this data point as something to consider in the seemingly never-ending debate over what exactly it is that creates the haze in this style.
View attachment 610775

Very interested in your findings...anxiously awaiting your results!!

 

[marchuk96]

View attachment 610782

Here's my latest iteration. I used Hornindal and fermented at 85F for 7 days. No dry hopping or spunding at all during the fermentation. After fermentation, I slowly crashed for I think 5 days down to about 42F. Then pressure transferred into a purged keg with dry hops already in it. I let it rise to room temp and did a dry hop for about 5 days total. Then did another pressure transfer to the serving keg where it's been chilling and carbing.

I wanted to try a kveik yeast because they are supposedly non-phenolic and I've been wondering if some off-flavors I've been experiencing were due to them. I also wanted to skip the biotransformation addition and rack off the yeast before dry hopping since my aromas and flavors have been lacking, in my opinion. This beer is probably the smoothest NEIPA I've ever made. Basically no bitterness or acridity from hop particles. There aren't any weird off flavors that I can detect. The aroma is mostly peaches. I would say I was expecting to get a little more citrus flavor than what I ended up with considering I used Citra and Galaxy but I have a few ideas for the next batch to see if they work. I did 8oz of hops in a low-temp whirlpool for I think 30 minutes and then 8oz of dry hops post-fermentation.

If you only got peach I would say your only getting kveik yeast character with a muddled hop character and the kveik is just dominating and nothing from hops because u used to much...if you used half that amount with everything else the same I bet you would of gotten that citrus component out of it

 

[SanPancho]

View attachment 610782

Here's my latest iteration. I used Hornindal and fermented at 85F for 7 days. No dry hopping or spunding at all during the fermentation. After fermentation, I slowly crashed for I think 5 days down to about 42F. Then pressure transferred into a purged keg with dry hops already in it. I let it rise to room temp and did a dry hop for about 5 days total. Then did another pressure transfer to the serving keg where it's been chilling and carbing.

I wanted to try a kveik yeast because they are supposedly non-phenolic and I've been wondering if some off-flavors I've been experiencing were due to them. I also wanted to skip the biotransformation addition and rack off the yeast before dry hopping since my aromas and flavors have been lacking, in my opinion. This beer is probably the smoothest NEIPA I've ever made. Basically no bitterness or acridity from hop particles. There aren't any weird off flavors that I can detect. The aroma is mostly peaches. I would say I was expecting to get a little more citrus flavor than what I ended up with considering I used Citra and Galaxy but I have a few ideas for the next batch to see if they work. I did 8oz of hops in a low-temp whirlpool for I think 30 minutes and then 8oz of dry hops post-fermentation.

been meaning to try one out with hornidal. glad to know you're seeing success. did you do anything different in terms of grist/mash/salts vs a "typical" NE yeast like 1318/so4/etc? my experience with kveik is sometimes thin, sometimes not...

 

[stickyfinger]

Yes! Please share your results with us! I've been doing blowoff tube on my kegs for 48ish hours, then 1oz/gal of regular pellets or 0.5 oz/gal of cryo, then purge headspace with CO2 several times and attach spunding valve and set to like 27-30 psi at 70F beer temp. I've really liked the results lately! I haven't ever tried chilling out some yeast and then dry hopping. I don't like beers that have hops added to the cold, carbonated beer in general. They taste too much like raw flowers or something (too much geraniol perhaps for me?) I get this character in a ton of beers from Equilibrium in Middletown, NY and don't really enjoy it, at least not as much as when I add the hops when yeast are around.

Based on some of the recent discussion in this thread, I decided first up should be the dry hop experiment. I split my wort from the BK into 2 kegs for fermentation - one would be dry hopped once at around 1.020 - 1.025 SG (which happened 40hrs post-pitch) and the other would be dry hopped after fermentation and chilling down to 60F to help drop the yeast out. I'll update with more details and results after I've given both batches some time to settle and carbonate, but one thing I noticed from the post fermentation samples (which I had already suspected, given that we know several of the commercial brewers are not hopping until post-fermentation), was that the post-fermentation dry hop beer already had most or all of the characteristic haze despite not having received any dry hop additions yet.


View attachment 610775

 

[stickyfinger]

Is it just me or does this seem like a terrible design for dumping trub? When you put the little trub cup back onto the bottom, doesn't it belch a huge bubble of air into your wort every time you open it?

I use a Fermentasaurous which is exactly that with the ability to dump trub. Humm, just thought of something. I actually dumped about 4 times. That would actually be a large source of air...think I found the problem. Maybe Ill just stick a bucket under it and dump pressurized next time.

 

[stickyfinger]

I've done a few with kveiks now, Hornindal and Hot Head. They can have the beer ready in like 5 days. Super fast and no diacetyl issues to worry about at all (if you have problems with that typically in dry-hopped beers.) Never did a side-by-side with 1318 or Imperial Dry Hop (my current favorites), but I think it would fair pretty well in comparison.

been meaning to try one out with hornidal. glad to know you're seeing success. did you do anything different in terms of grist/mash/salts vs a "typical" NE yeast like 1318/so4/etc? my experience with kveik is sometimes thin, sometimes not...

 

[Hannabrew]

How low of a pitch have folks tried with imperial dry hop?

I'm debating trying .35

 

[marchuk96]

How low of a pitch have folks tried with imperial dry hop?

I'm debating trying .35

I just did one with juice with no starter into a 1.077 wort at 78 peak temp and I can't say I noticed much...don't know what that comes out to pitch rate wise... Although the hard part for me in determining if it did do anything was I used calypso,cashmere hops and cascade luplin...all of which ive never used before...I can say it was def different from my normal...but was it the pitch rate and temp or the hops??? idk

 

[SRJHops]

this style just shouldn’t be bottled conditioned. Not saying it can’t with extreme dedication, but it only takes a little oxygen contact and it will degrade

While I TOTALLY agree that oxygen is the supreme enemy of this style, I've bottle conditioned 3 NEIPA's so far and none have oxidized.

I fill the carboy and just leave a little headspace. I ONLY dry hop on Day 2 and do not open the fermenter again until bottling on Day 14. I (of course) do not transfer to secondary, and I do not transfer to the bottling bucket -- I bottle right from primary into bombers with 2 sugar tablets, and use oxygen absorbing caps.

I opened a 2-month old (warm) bottle tonight with the intention of dumping it (so I could use the bottle for my latest batch). I was amazed that it hadn't oxidized and tasted as good as 1/2 the commercial NEIPA's I've tried.

For my latest batch I did a second dry hop 3 days before bottling (which I'm doing tonight), then purged with some squirts from a can of wine preserver gas. We'll see what happens -- fingers crossed! If if oxidizes I'll go back to just dry hopping during active fermentation...

Oh, and BTW, 5 vials of hop oil came in the mail for me today! Azacca, Amarillo, Chinook, Centennial, and Columbus. I'm going to put a few drops into 5 of the bottles (one kind of hops per bottle) and see what happens! (Kinda thinking it's cheating?)

 

[Hannabrew]

I just did one with juice with no starter into a 1.077 wort at 78 peak temp and I can't say I noticed much...don't know what that comes out to pitch rate wise... Although the hard part for me in determining if it did do anything was I used calypso,cashmere hops and cascade luplin...all of which ive never used before...I can say it was def different from my normal...but was it the pitch rate and temp or the hops??? idk

I have a package from Nov 30, and want to pitch into 6G of 1.065. might be pushing it

 

[Dgallo]

While I TOTALLY agree that oxygen is the supreme enemy of this style, I've bottle conditioned 3 NEIPA's so far and none have oxidized.

I fill the carboy and just leave a little headspace. I ONLY dry hop on Day 2 and do not open the fermenter again until bottling on Day 14. I (of course) do not transfer to secondary, and I do not transfer to the bottling bucket -- I bottle right from primary into bombers with 2 sugar tablets, and use oxygen absorbing caps.

I opened a 2-month old (warm) bottle tonight with the intention of dumping it (so I could use the bottle for my latest batch). I was amazed that it hadn't oxidized and tasted as good as 1/2 the commercial NEIPA's I've tried.

Would love to see a picture of the pour. I just find it so hard to believe, especially having it sit warm on the dead regrowth yeast from the carb. If your getting zero oxidation at all your certainly doing it perfect

 

[couchsending]

If you want to try to underpitch Conan I’d suggest you do it with very fresh yeast.. or order the yeast bay version. It’s always fresh and you can get away with pitching the small quantity they send you.

Also if anyone is interested in some more biotransformation info there’s a new MBAA podcast from today all about it. Granted the guest works for a yeast supplier so take it for what it’s worth but still an interesting listen.

 

[Hannabrew]

Too late...I gave it a healthy dose of nutrient and oxygen. hopefully it doesn't suck

 

[marchuk96]

I have a package from Nov 30, and want to pitch into 6G of 1.065. might be pushing it

Maybe but knowing that brand of yeast I wouldn't be surprised if it did just fine... you could always make a small starter and see what it does...

 

[marchuk96]

Yes! Please share your results with us! I've been doing blowoff tube on my kegs for 48ish hours, then 1oz/gal of regular pellets or 0.5 oz/gal of cryo, then purge headspace with CO2 several times and attach spunding valve and set to like 27-30 psi at 70F beer temp. I've really liked the results lately! I haven't ever tried chilling out some yeast and then dry hopping. I don't like beers that have hops added to the cold, carbonated beer in general. They taste too much like raw flowers or something (too much geraniol perhaps for me?) I get this character in a ton of beers from Equilibrium in Middletown, NY and don't really enjoy it, at least not as much as when I add the hops when yeast are around.

Sticky you mentioned equilibrium... You must be from new York if you have had there stuff??

 

[ThirstyPawsHB]

Precisely

 

[marchuk96]

While I TOTALLY agree that oxygen is the supreme enemy of this style, I've bottle conditioned 3 NEIPA's so far and none have oxidized.

I fill the carboy and just leave a little headspace. I ONLY dry hop on Day 2 and do not open the fermenter again until bottling on Day 14. I (of course) do not transfer to secondary, and I do not transfer to the bottling bucket -- I bottle right from primary into bombers with 2 sugar tablets, and use oxygen absorbing caps.

I opened a 2-month old (warm) bottle tonight with the intention of dumping it (so I could use the bottle for my latest batch). I was amazed that it hadn't oxidized and tasted as good as 1/2 the commercial NEIPA's I've tried.

For my latest batch I did a second dry hop 3 days before bottling (which I'm doing tonight), then purged with some squirts from a can of wine preserver gas. We'll see what happens -- fingers crossed! If if oxidizes I'll go back to just dry hopping during active fermentation...

Oh, and BTW, 5 vials of hop oil came in the mail for me today! Azacca, Amarillo, Chinook, Centennial, and Columbus. I'm going to put a few drops into 5 of the bottles (one kind of hops per bottle) and see what happens! (Kinda thinking it's cheating?)

I'd also like to not only see a pic but also be able too try it.. I've never bottled any n.e and have it not degrade over that length of time... no disrespect here but have you ever had our tasted what an oxidized beer tastes like?? I mean maybe your bottling technique could be that good...but that's a tough one too get behind no matter how careful you are!

 

[Hannabrew]

Maybe but knowing that brand of yeast I wouldn't be surprised if it did just fine... you could always make a small starter and see what it does...

A24 from imperial. batch was already done so no time for a starter. I totally misread the date on the package and thought it was fresh-ish.

we'll see what happens.

 

[marchuk96]

A24 from imperial. batch was already done so no time for a starter. I totally misread the date on the package and thought it was fresh-ish.

we'll see what happens.

Good luck...I bet you'll be fine

 

[hezagenius]

been meaning to try one out with hornidal. glad to know you're seeing success. did you do anything different in terms of grist/mash/salts vs a "typical" NE yeast like 1318/so4/etc? my experience with kveik is sometimes thin, sometimes not...

I believe I did 150:150 Cl:SO4
Nothing unusual in the grist
Mashed at 152F for 60 minutes

My three primary objectives were to 1) give kveik a shot, 2) skip the biotransformation addition and 3) transfer off the yeast before dry hopping. I wanted to see if I could still make a decent NEIPA doing those things.

My concern is did I get enough out of the dry hop? 8oz free floating in a corny keg might not have achieved enough hop saturation. I swirled the keg several times a day during dry hopping but I don't know how well it mixed.

 

[ttuato]

How low of a pitch have folks tried with imperial dry hop?

I'm debating trying .35

Go for it. 0.35 is my standard w/ Barbarian A04 - (Conan). I read somewhere that the A24 blend is predominantly A04 w/ a little bit of A20.

I overbuild starter to get ~80B cells for next batch, then I just double it each time I brew- 80B to pitch & 80B saved for next time. I am on my 6th gen. Get Stonefruit consitently with low pitch and 63* for first few days.