Discovery IPA 2.0

Name: Discovery IPA
Style: American India Pale Ale
Source: Original recipe for the malts and hops

Round one          Round three         Round four   Round five

Stats

Brewed: 4/21/13
Bottled: 5/7/13
Opened: 5/28/13

Original Gravity:        1.065
Final Gravity:             1.015
Hydrometer ABV:     6.5%
Color:                        6.1 SRM
IBU                            64

Recipe    (5 gallons)

4lbs 8oz  Pale 2 Row Malt
12oz       Vienna Malt
4oz         Victory Malt
2oz         Honey Malt

5 lbs   Light Liquid Malt Extract (25 minutes)

.75 oz Chinook (13% AAU) – 60 minutes
1.0 oz Cascade (5.5% AAU)- 30 minutes
..75 oz Centennial (10% AAU) – 10 minutes

Yeast:  WLP001 California Ale

Other: 1 tsp Irish Moss, pinch of yeast nutrient at 10 minutes

The rest of the story

Round two of IPA experimentation. I hadn’t thought about it before, but the IPA is the one brew I haven’t done off of a clone recipe. In the first recipe, I was hoping for a more biscuity flavor, but it really didn’t come through. This time I went for a more nutty flavor with the Victory Malt,, along with more malty than sweet with more Vienna and no Crystal.

After my extremely low efficiency with the Wry Smile Pale Ale, I went to a modified brew in the bag method. It would still be a partial mash with extract added in the boil, but with the larger bag I was hoping for more water contact with the grains. Using the two smaller bags left some pretty tightly packed grains, and I was hoping that this would make the difference.

Brew day went pretty well. Mash temperature was relatively stable, though slightly low (closer to 150 than 152). preheated the extract again so there was less of a temperature crash. Chilling went OK, but I should have let it go a bit longer. I measured the gravity when it was around 80 degrees, and using a brewing calculator I found that I would need to add about 7/8 of a gallon. Since the water was sitting in the garage, I was anticipating it providing a bit more cooling. I should have put some in the fridge like I have done in the past. Temperatures were closer to 74 when I put the yeast in (from a 1.5 qt starter).

Original Gravity: 1.065

The temperature was pretty steady at 72-74 for two weeks, and then climbed to 78 on the last day (strangely warm weekend for Seattle). Hopefully the 68ish temperature of the starter means that there weren’t too many weird by-products from the yeast or any hot alcohol flavors.

Bottled on day 16 with 3.8 oz of sugar. With the exception of the Paradise Ale that has been wildly overcarbonated, the recent beers have been a bit flat. I ended up getting 52 twelve ounce bottles, so guessed the volume a bit low, so the IPA might not be as bubbly as hoped.

Final Gravity: 1015
Alcohol Percentage: 6.5%

Final gravity was right on target. The house has cooled a bit in the last few days, so the beer should age at a decent temperature.

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The increase of IBUs did not make much of a difference, as it still did not have that IPA bite. Decent flavor though, but just not an IPA. Still a bit muddled as well on the malt profile, so that needs to be tweaked as well.