Tuesday, July 19, 2016

Summer Hops IPA

Jillian down at Jay's Brewing home brew supply recently got a stock of Summer hops in, and set 2 oz aside for me, for which I am greatly appreciative.  She'd done some research (BeerMumbo says "apricot and melon profile") and landed upon this hop in particular, and I'm really looking forward to trying this in a fruit-forward IPA.

Something that's a bit different in the way I'm using hops is the hop schedule.  I'm not trying to get an overpoweringly bitter beer, as much as I'm trying to coax aroma and flavor out of the hops.  For example, Old Busthead Brewing recently posted to Facebook regarding an "ExtraExtra Ordinary Double Dry-hopped Double IPA in honor of our 2nd Anniversary."  The DIPA has 2 dry hops, as well as two hot hop additions (kettle, whirlpool), and comes out at 2 IBU.  I can't even begin to imagine how the Simcoe and Citra hops taste in the beer!

I'll be very interested to see how this one turns out.

Brew Day: 19 July 2016

Partial Mash:
1 lb Pilsen Malt
1.5 oz flaked wheat

Boil (60 min):
1 lb Pilsen DME
4 oz table sugar

Hop Schedule:
14 g Summer hops  (FWH)
1 oz Summer hops (flameout, steep)

Yeast: Safale US-05, 1/2 tube Clarity Firm

*I followed all of my usual procedures for partial mashing, cooling the wort, and pitching the yeast.

Addendum, 31 July; Dry hopped early this morning, with 14 g Summer hops.

Addendum, 8 Aug: Bottled tonight, with 1 oz of table sugar dissolved in 1/2 cup of boiling water.  I got 9 good bottles out of it.  Everything was cleaned up and put away quickly.  I'm looking forward to trying this one around the end of Aug.

Addendum, 24 Aug: Tried my first one of these tonight.  Wow.  The beer poured with a nice white, pillowy head, and there was a good bit of lacing throughout.  The beer was clear and straw colored, and the first sip was full of sweet fruit flavor, without the harsh, cloying bitterness usually associated with IPAs.  I really enjoyed this beer, and I'm definitely going to continue using the hopping schedule.

Addendum, 1 Nov: I recently found out that my daughter has taken a liking to IPAs, so I invited her over to the house last night to try one of these IPAs, have some dinner, and help pass out candy.  She said that she really liked the IPA and that it tasted "fruity".  I thought that was pretty good because (a) it was what I was shooting for, and (b) I hadn't told her anything about what to expect from the beer.

3 comments:

  1. Please let us know how this turns out!

    Forrest
    www.greycpas.com

    ReplyDelete
  2. Forrest,

    I will! I dry hopped on Monday, and went on travel, so I'll likely bottle Sun or Mon at the latest. From there, it'll be a couple of weeks for bottle conditioning, but I'll definitely post my tasting notes here when I try it!

    ReplyDelete