Brew 7 - Off The Cuff IPA


Brew 7 - Off The Cuff (Hazy IPA)
 
                                                                                                           

Brew day: 22/07/2020
Bottle day: 04/08/2020

So, up to now, I have brewed beer based on the recipes kindly provided by Brewdog. I've learned a lot and have had great success and naturally some not so successful brews (See Brew 3...). This time, something a little different for me. I'm going to piece together a recipe that brings together some of my favourite things in beer in the form of a Hazy IPA. I guess you could call it an NEIPA but as I'm based here in Devon, UK - lets just call in a Hazy IPA. I'm going to based the recipe on a standard IPA and then throw in a load of flaked oats to add the haze, skip the Irish Moss and then leave in as much of the trub and sediment as I dare. It might work, it might not but nothing ventured, nothing gained. 

To start, the malt bill. Extra Pale to start, a good strong base providing most of the fermentable sugar - 5kg. Next up, a little Caramalt to add some colour - just 200g. Finally, I want some haze so I've gone with 600g of Flaked Oats. This is coming out at 6.3% on the recipe calculator. 

Next, the hop bill. I'm going to go for a high IBU plus dry hop. Columbus is going to provide the base bitterness - 15g in at the start. Next, I love Citra so I'm adding 15g at 30mins (this should give a good mix of bitter and flavour from this hop). My next choice is Idaho 7 - one I haven't brewed with yet and I have little idea if it goes with the other hops. 15g in with 15 mins left to go for this one. For dry hop, I'm going to chuck in 25g of Citra and 25g of Idaho 7, 4 days into fermentation. 

I'm opting for an US-05 yeast - it seems to be the yeast of choice for IPAs although I might play around with a yeast strain with a lower flocculation if I try this again. 

My Get Er Brewed order arrived swiftly - again 5 days including a weekend is good going. I decide to brew on a Wednesday evening with my new kit addition - a 22 litre stock pot purchased with birthday money. I'm hoping to speed up the process by making one batch. 

That goes well until I realise my mash tun is too small and won't take 20L of water plus 5.8kg of malt/oats but a quick bit of thinking means I have 10L in the cool box and the other 10L on the hob sat in the stock pot with a small gas flame to maintain temperature at 67 deg C. The temperature fluctuates a little but it will do for a quick fix. Preboil gravity measured at 1.048 (54% efficiency - not bad - could do better) - the good news is, this will only go up from here. 

An hour in and I'm onto the boil which will be quicker as I now about somewhere between 17-19L of wort ready to go. Rolling boil takes a little while longer so I stick the lid on just to speed things along and then take it off when its going. 

Whoops! All going swimmingly and I'm about to put in the last hop addition (Idaho 7 15mins to go) and I have a vague recollection about dry hops... I realise I've added the whole pack of Citra to the boil! Well this bugger is going to be bitter! Brewer's friend reckons 114.74 IBU... go job I like Citra. I decide to push on with the recipe and save back 25g of Idaho 7 for dry hop. 

Boil over and I leave the hop bags in for a little to steep a little extra of the goodness into the wort. The beer is already showing signs of the hot break and the proteins have flocculated really heavily. I notice as the wort cools that this is happening even further - hitting cold break without any effort today - I'm not sure that I want the flocculation but as I've not made this beer style before I have little to compare it to. Regardless - it has a great colour and already smells great. 

Orignal Gravity is 1.058 against a target of 1.064 - which isn't too far off target - will have to see how the yeast gets on with this one and find out what strength we are at. If I hit target FG (1.016) then we are looking at a 5.5%, anything lower than that and the ABV will be higher. 

Updates to follow...







Bottling Day (04/08/2020): 
I tried a new carbonation method - boiling up 400ml of water and mixing in the required priming sugar (around 75g). This was added to the pressure barrel before adding the brew allowing it to mix. 

The beer is looking nicely hazy, I'm just hoping that the haze holds in the bottle otherwise I might need to agitate the bottles before drinking! I think for a first hazy beer its looking good. Perhaps lacking a bit of dry hop kick (my mistake for throwing too much Citra on the boil) but there is a good dryness/bitterness mixed with hoppy flavour. 

Bottling was good and I got 24 bottles out of the batch. 

16/08/2020: The beer is tasting so good after 2 week conditioning - there is a decent bitterness with a slight fruity kick. The beer has cleared a bit more than I perhaps wanted for a Hazy IPA but a quick inversion of the bottle and haze can be added to the beer if desired. I'm going to wait another 2 weeks before rating this brew properly. 

Review - A really good result all round considering the experimental nature of the recipe. Dry and bitter with a decent hop added by the Citra and Idaho 7. More of a classic IPA than a Hazy IPA as the beer cleared really well and didn't give the haze that I hoped for. Need to perhaps consider adding wheat and using a west coast yeast next time. Really impressed with the ABV and probably my best efficiency using this method, further to that, my fave IPA to date. Overall score: 4.25/5. 

Ingredients
Malts: Crisp Extra Pale Malt, Caramalt, Flaked Oats. 
Hops: Columbus, Citra and Idaho 7. 
Yeast: Fermentis Safale US-05 Yeast
Batch size Target: 15L 
Batch size into FV: 13L
Batch size Actual: 12.5L
Number of bottles from batch: 24 Bottles (21 x 500ml, 2 x 650ml and 2 x 330ml)
Target OG: 1.064
Actual OG: 1.058
Target FG: 1.016
Gravity on 01/08/2020: 1.006
Actual FG: 1.006
Target ABV: 6.3%
Actual ABV: 6.8%
Brew Efficiency: 42%

Recipe: https://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/recipe/view/1083252/off-the-cuff


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