What should I use to hop this beer??

[cgreene]

Ok guys do this is my second time brewing and I have a Chico Pale Ale 5 gallon all grain kit that I bought from Great Fermentations. The 1st brew I did was a mosaic IPA and damn it was delicious. So now I am thinking I might want to turn this pale ale into an IPA. My wife bought me 9lbs of hops for Christmas so I have an array of combinations to use but I don't know what to use. My grain bill is as follows..
10lbs 2-row
1lb crystal 60L

Can I covert this to an IPA?

If so, what hop schedule and combination of hops should I use?

I have one pound of each of the following hops..

Amarillo
Apollo
Citra
Cascade
Chinook
CTZ
Mosaic
Magnum
Nugget

Open to any and all suggestions. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[TexasDroughtBrewery]

You could easily make this an IPA its really more of a preference on what do you WANT to use? Maybe try this out...and others please put your input in as well. I used this type of hop schedule before and got a pretty juice IPA out of it.

10lbs 2-row
.5 lb crystal 60L

0.5 oz (14 g) Nugget pellets, (60 min)
2.0 oz (28 g) Citra pellets, (15 min)
1.5 oz (28 g) Mosaic pellets, (15 min)
1.0 oz (28 g) Citra pellets,. (steep 10 min)
.5 oz (28 g) Mosaic pellets, (steep 10 min)

1.0 oz (28 g) Mosaic pellets, dry hop
1.0 oz (28 g) Citra pellets, dry hop

 

[Decimotox]

I like TDB's suggestion, for sure. As he said, it's all about what you want.

Here's what I'd do for a nice, citrusy flavor.

1 oz. Magnum (60)
1 oz. Cascade (15)
1 oz. Amarillo (15)
1 oz. Citra (15)
1 oz. Cascade (15)
.5 oz. Citra (5)
.5 oz. Cascade (5)
2 oz. Citra (flame out)

7 day dry hop with 1 oz each of Amarillo, Cascade, Citra.

 

[cgreene]

Thank you for your feedback on this. I'm going to give it a go tomorrow and will let you guys know how it goes. I like the look of both recipes so I think I'm just going to have to flip a coin and see which one I do. Thanks again for the advice as I am still a total noob.

Also another quick question. I assume the steep hop additions are at flameout?? And do you just let them sit or do you stir for that duration and create a whirlpool??

 

[brandonlovesbeer]

I would say go ahead and use some of the hops on your list. [emoji57]

 

[tbred]

I am a big fan of Citra and Mosaic together.

 

[DaWhip]

I would do Mosaic, then a little more Mosaic, then a lot more Mosaic at flameout. Maybe whirlpool a little Mosaic, and probably dryhop with whatever Mosaic I have left. That's just me though...

 

[FatDragon]

Good god, man! 9 pounds of hops for a first time brewer? That's going straight in to the deep end! Be sure to store those babies well - preferably vacuum sealed in the freezer - or they'll only be good for lambics and fertilizer after a while. This is doubly important after you open each individual pound.

Your kit presumably includes a bittering charge (Magnum?) and 3-4 oz of Cascade, which would be a fairly accurate Sierra Nevada Pale Ale kit, so to make it an IPA you'll want to boost the bittering charge a bit and supplement the late Cascade additions with more hops, either more Cascade or something else. Most of your hops would pair nicely with Cascade for late-additions. For my suggestion: Amarillo is sometimes considered a Cascade substitute but they're also quite good together

Others have suggested Citra, so let's get something straight here: Citra is the Konami cheat code of fruity IPAs - it's so tasty and effective there's hardly any challenge to it; just a delicious beer with such a powerfully juicy hop profile that you can get away with a few brewing mistakes and still be delighted with the result. It's fun to make good IPAs without a god-mode hop like Citra, but you're unlikely to go wrong with a Citra IPA.

 

[cgreene]

Thanks for the advice FatDragon. Yes I will be vacuum sealing them and they are always stored in the freezer. I know 9lbs is a little much but I'm not complaining when the wife buys it for me.

 

[TexasDroughtBrewery]

Thank you for your feedback on this. I'm going to give it a go tomorrow and will let you guys know how it goes. I like the look of both recipes so I think I'm just going to have to flip a coin and see which one I do. Thanks again for the advice as I am still a total noob.

Also another quick question. I assume the steep hop additions are at flameout?? And do you just let them sit or do you stir for that duration and create a whirlpool??

Yes steep is flameout, go for the whirlpool

 

[Redtab78]

Thanks for the advice FatDragon. Yes I will be vacuum sealing them and they are always stored in the freezer. I know 9lbs is a little much but I'm not complaining when the wife buys it for me.

I make little bags with my vacuum sealer, and then store them in 1oz packs...I did the same as you though, after my first batch, straight off the deep end, but I stayed at about 5 lbs lol

looking at the recipe for the grain on their site, its just 10# of pale malt and 1lb crystal 60, however it does have 3oz of cascade already in the kit 1oz for boil, and 2 oz for dry hop...and it gives an IBU of 35-40...so what about bumping the IBU some some and a little more added at the end of the boil?

The recipie on their site for the hop schedule has:
1oz @ 90 min of perle (I think I would scrath this and save that perle for something different)
1oz @ 45 min of cascade.

I think I would change to:
(keep the 90 min boil but don't add hops until 60 min in the following)
1oz nugget @ 60 (for bittering)
.5oz each mosaic and citra @20
.5oz each of mosaic and citra @ 10
.5oz each of mosaic and citra @ flameout (let sit/steep for 10 min before chilling)

then dry hop with 1oz each of mosaic and citra for last 6 days in the secondary (or primary if you don't secondary, but after fermentation is complete)

The OTHER option that I would consider is:
1oz nugget @ 60
.5oz each cascade and Amarillo @ 20
.5oz each cascade and Amarillo @ 10
.5oz each cascade and Amarillo @ 5

1 oz each cascade and amarillo dry hop


just my .2

 

[Redtab78]

Or you could drop the crystal out and make a SMASH with just 1 hop of your choice...

 

[cgreene]

Well brew day is complete and Decimotox's recipe won the coin flip. Everything went relatively well considering it was Friday the 13th. I say relative because my mash temp was a little low on this. It called for 153-155 but I was more like 150 on it. However I still hit the OG of 1.054 so I'm happy. This being my second batch of beer, I did thoroughly enjoy drinking my home brew mosaic IPA while brewing this today. Another first for me. Holy S!&$ this brewing thing is addicting. I'm already wanting to plan my next. I do have another 8.5lbs or so of hops to use up!! Thanks again for all the feedback, advice and criticisms. I will keep you posted on how things progress. CHEERS fellas!!

 

[TexasDroughtBrewery]

Awww man I lost the coin flip!!

LOL, im sure this beer is going to be just as good as your first one. Keep us posted man.

 

[kristiismean]

my favorite hop is Amarillo, by itself or coupled with another hop (doing a amarillo, citra and galaxy ipa/pale ale currently).

as you being a new brewer, I would not use them all right away. I would do pale ales, using .5 magnum and maybe 2 oz of hops per beer, figure out what you need to do for your backbone and figure out what you like. (So not a smash). Also, easier to see what .5 oz of citra matched with 1oz of mosaic does using only 1.5 oz of those instead of using 5 oz of them to find it's not a good blend (but it is a good blend, fyi). start small, get the process down, then take off! (smashes are good for figuring out what a hop does without being influenced by many different malts, and vice versa). My typical grain bill is Pale 2 row, or just 2 row, 1 lbs flaked wheat.

My beers don't get the holy crap this is great effect all the time, but I get the "your beers have a great malty backbone" that I use to build on for bigger or more flavorful beers.