"Top of the head" IPA

[sertainment]

Grain Bill:
10 lbs American 2-row
1 lb Crystal 20
1 lb Victory

Hops:
5 oz. Tomahawk (Pellet)
- 2 oz. 60 minutes
- 1 oz. 20 minutes
- 1 oz. 5 minutes
- 1 oz. 0 minutes
2 oz. Centennial (Leaf)
- 2 oz. dry hopping 2 weeks

Yeast:

Wyeast 1056



Mash at 155 for 60 minutes, batch sparge, boil for 60 minutes, primary 1 week, secondary 2 weeks, bottle 2 weeks.

What do you all think? sound like the name of the beer? I am at work making a last second plan to brew in the morning tomorrow and this is what I came up with for a solid IPA. your thoughts?

 

[WayFrae]

This should turn out as a pretty good IPA. For my tastes,I prefer dryer, less sweet IPAs.

If I was to brew this I would drop the caramel malt and add a pound of white wheat malt for body and mash at 150°F.

I haven't had much experience with victory malt in an IPA so I don't have any opinion on that, it should give a nutty, biscuit flavor I think.

As far as the hop schedule goes, I would drop the 60 min addition to 1 oz and add the additional ounce at flame out and let it steep after flameout for 30 min. I would also at least double the dry hops. I would make these changes because I like an IPA with a lot of aroma, like a punch you in the nose aroma.

 

[sertainment]

I like your style, I love hop face punchers, good call

 

[NathPowe]

I'd cut the victory and crystal in half and add a pound of base to make up for it. I also agree completely with Wayfrae - I'd move one of the ounces of CTZ from 60minutes to flameout and steep the flameout addition for a while. 2oz of CTZ at 60 minutes is going to be intensely bitter, especially since I can't imagine your OG will be all that high with that grain bill... but maybe that's what you're going for. You'll still have an assertive bitterness with an ounce at 60min and 20min. Again in agreement with Wayfrae that I like a dryer beer. Mashing at 155 for an IPA seems pretty high. Lastly, I'd probably add a bit more to the dry hop (an ounce of CTZ would be awesome in there), but more importantly I wouldn't leave them sitting in there for 2 weeks. I usually dry hop for about 4 days and get great aroma.

Just my two cents. Actually maybe it was more like four cents. Anyway, enjoy the brew.

Cheers.

 

[Yooper]

I was going to say what NathPowe said, almost!

I'd cut the crystal and victory in half also, mash at 151/152, and that'd be an IPA similar to Bell's Three Hearted, but a toasty version of it.

It looks good enough that maybe I will brew it when my centennials are harvested this fall.