Style of the Week 31/5/06 - IPA

[bconnery]

Greene King IPA is often available in bottleshops, bigger ones at least and at English pubs on occasion. I quite like that one.
Emersons is excellent.
JS is a nice enough beer but misses the mark for the style in my book, ditto Tui.
American IPAs can be another beast altogether with the hops and malt taken that little bit bigger. I wasn't a fan of the Imperial IPA I tried. Too much in my book.
Any kit recipe must have the hops upped as hops are what this style is all about.

Here's my boringly named India Pale Ale IPA.

2.5kg Light DME. 1.5kg Amber LME. 50g Cascade Hops. 20g fuggles hops. 30g Goldings Hops. SAFALE S-04 Yeast.

2.5kg Light DME, 1.5kg Amber LME, 40g Cascade, 20g Goldings at 60. 10g Goldings, 10g Cascade at 40.
20g Fuggles at end.
3/4 cup of malto-dextrin for priming (This is what I used following part of the recipe I was kind of following, ish. Use a little more as it was slow to carbonate).

 

[Steve]

Maharaja IPA - (post borrowed from my clubs forum)

This is made by Avery in Boul/Col and according to the post I read this is their recipe.
I have converted to metric and for 100 litres

Pale 33kg
Amber 3.5kg
Xtal 1.2kg

Hopping
For a 90 minute boil

100gm magnum 13% at 30 minutes
100gm Magnum 13% at 60 minutes
200gms of Simcoe at 90 minutes
200gms of Centenial at 90 minutes

nothing really unusual i guess....until

Dry Hopping

Simcoe 2600gms
Crystal 1150 gms
Centenial 1150gms

here is the original post

Quote:
I spoke briefly with Steven Breezley, the Production Manager at Avery who was happy to share the original recipe. Steve sent me the following in an e-mail:

Thanks again for your interest and sorry I didn't have time to talk to you more yesterday. Yes I'm familiar with brewers that don't like to divulge recipes, but we are not that way here at Avery. We enjoy that people like our beers enough to brew them. We also realize that these same people have, or will want to compare their products to the original model which obviously benefits us. Lastly we just enjoy the fact that people are making good beers and if we can help with that, fantastic! Enough of our philosophies, let's get down to the recipe:

Maharaja:
OG - 1.085
AE - 1.012
% ABV - 9.9%
IBU's - 102
Water - lactic acid to bring down alkalinity to around 40-50ppm
CaCl2 - 0.7oz/bbl
Grist:
88% 2-Row
9% Briess Victory malt
3% Great Western C-120
Single temp infusion mash 151F

Kettle Hops: (90 min. boil)
Magnum (GR) 13%AA - 5.3 oz/bbl @ 30 min.
Magnum (GR) 13%AA - 5.3 oz/bbl @ 60 min.
Simcoe - 9.2oz/bbl - 90 min
Centennial - 9.2 oz/bbl - 90 min

Yeast:
Avery house strain (similar to London Ale - Wyeast 1028)
Ferment @ 70 F

Dry Hops:
(I know these numbers will seem ridiculous, but they are correct)
7.6 lbs/bbl Simcoe
3.3 lbs/bbl Crystal
3.3lbs/bbl Centennial
have fun getting this much into your vessel!

Cheers
Steve

 

[jayse]

I'am not so sure what to add but I'll try come up with something as I type. :blink:

Firstly I'll mention for anyone interested in further reading of the history the classic beer style series book 'Pale Ale' has gone into the original east india pale ales at reasonbly great length.
I guess as far as recipe make up goes for these original ones to put it reasonbly broadly were most likely single malt beers. Gravity was around 1.060-1.070 using yeast with very high attenuation and low flocculation in the burton union type system of fermentation. It is quite possible that sugar may have been used given the very high attenuation but from memory the book is not 100% clear on this but does go into length to discuss it such as various reasons why they may or possibly may not have used sugar. The hopping rates are given for most of these original beers but purely as hop weights into volumes, ie pounds into gallons. The author goes on to try his best to, crudely i guess you could say, work out a estimated IBU. The original Hodgson's looks to be the most highly hopped at what would work out to very roughly 350g in one of our 25 litre batchs with bass at the other end at only half that.
Personally i'am just guessing at the given infomation throughout the whole section that the bass was possibly a better beer also having a higher final gravity, for the most part the modern day versions we brew would possibly be closer to this beer.

Anyway it makes a interesting read for those interested.

To go forward and to pull to bits some modern IPA home brewers recipes I tend to think some people may be over doing the crystal malts, but I say that about a lot of styles. Personally I stick to only 5% or less, for the malt complexity I go down the very modern trail as most do and use some munich style malts and a touch of english style toasted malts like amber malt in a reasonbly small amount. Also use just a touch of choc malt if needed to bring it into the 20-28 EBC range, 28 ebc is pushing the high end of the colour range and may be seen as to dark by some, even to the point of loosing points in comp, persoanlly my best have all been the darker ones. Anyway if your brewing for comps sticking to the middle of the colour range may possibly be best.
One of the biggest faults I have found in some brewers IPA's i have had is they really need to be perfectly clear because any yeast in the beer will take a hell of a lot away from what the beer should taste and feel like and of course look like.

I can't really think of anything else to rave on about now so will shut up, I'll just leave with one final word and that is i like them to be fairly well balanced and the hop flavour to be rounded using Carefull selection of hops and amounts. In the end really it comes down to brewing a great beer and more often than not keeping it reasonbly simply and well thought out will yeild the best result, combine that with sound brewing practices and bobs your drunken uncle.

Damn I can dribble **** :blink:
Jayse

 

[warrenlw63]

Anyone attempting the style will find this a very good read on the now-defunct Brewing Techniques Website.

India Pale Ale, Part I: IPA and Empire
India Pale Ale, Part II: The Sun Never Sets

Hope this helps.

Warren -

One of the biggest faults I have found in some brewers IPA's i have had is they really need to be perfectly clear because any yeast in the beer will take a hell of a lot away from what the beer should taste and feel like and of course look like.

To agree and disagree with you up to a point Jayse. I've tasted and seen a lot of cloudy/hazy IPAs too. I think the reason being for this is not suspended yeast moreso than hop pellet-derived haze.

Ask the brewers responsible and they'll always tell you how they dry-hopped the beer with about 40-60g of EKG or Fuggles pellets.

Probably better to dry hop with plugs. Benefits are most likely twofold. Possibly a clearer beer from an absence of pellet dust and a fresh flavour from a hop that's not been pounded to death by a hammer mill. :beerbang:

Warren -

 

[Stuster]

Yep, great reads. Which is why I linked to them in the original post.

Sorry, Warren, should have said what the links were.

Any yeast preferences for this style, especially English IPAs?

 

[warrenlw63]

Whoops.

Scuse that Stuster. :lol:

It would appear I'm preaching to the converted.

Warren -

 

[pint of lager]

bconnery said:

3/4 cup of malto-dextrin for priming (This is what I used following part of the recipe I was kind of following, ish. Use a little more as it was slow to carbonate).

This is wrong. You have been reading an American recipe.

Maltodextrin (or often referred to as corn syrup) is not fermentable. It provides body and a slight sweetness to a beer. It is used in conjunction with malt and dextrose to provide some body to kit brews.

You want to prime with dextrose or castor sugar (plain white sugar that has smaller crystals and is easier to dissolve.) Some people do use DME, brown sugar or honey to prime with.

 

[bconnery]

bconnery said:

3/4 cup of malto-dextrin for priming (This is what I used following part of the recipe I was kind of following, ish. Use a little more as it was slow to carbonate).

This is wrong. You have been reading an American recipe.

Maltodextrin (or often referred to as corn syrup) is not fermentable. It provides body and a slight sweetness to a beer. It is used in conjunction with malt and dextrose to provide some body to kit brews.

You want to prime with dextrose or castor sugar (plain white sugar that has smaller crystals and is easier to dissolve.) Some people do use DME, brown sugar or honey to prime with.

You are correct.
And what I didn't say as I copy and pasted this from my brewing notes this morning, pre coffee, is that I actually used DME, and it still wasn't enough.
I always use Dextrose myself. Apart from that one time.

 

[RobW]

A note on terminology (flame suit on)- is there such as a thing as an American IPA? I personally don't believe there is. An IPA is made with predominantly British (or equivalent) malts & hops. Once you start using Cascade, Chinook & other US hops & 1056 yeast you have an A(merican)PA, maybe an Imperial APA even but not an American IPA. To call it an American IPA is like ramping up the hops & gravity of a Coopers clone & calling it an Australian IPA.

 

[Stuster]

I don't really agree. What is an English IPA but a stronger, hoppier pale ale? h34r:

A few quotes from the BT article.

Bass achieved its hop bitterness by using large quantities of Fuggle, Kent Golding, and imported hops. Several breweries reported using Californian and German hops for up to 50% of the bittering additions.

IPA's success was not lost on American brewers. Brewers in the northeastern United States brewed pale ales with original gravities between 1.060 and 1.076 during this period [late 19th cent] and labeled them as India Pale Ale

In Britain today, IPA is often merely a synonym for best or special bitter.

Michael Jackson, for example, refers to IPA as a "super-premium pale ale"

Fortunately for IPA lovers in the United States, small States-side breweries produce IPAs more true to style than do their English counterparts.

Classifying beers into styles is really not that important in Britain and styles are fairly loose. It was really the rise of the American craft/microbrewers that has resulted in all this style business. I suggest that the historic style has been resurrected by American brewers and if they want to call their stronger pale ales IPAs then why not? Words change with the times, and I suggest this one has. If you want to call your souped up Coopers clone an OzIPA then go for it.

Tony, what have you started? :angry: :lol:

 

[Steve]

Did the americans make it and send it to India in the 1800s to quench the thirst of the memsabs?
Cheers
Steve

 

[Stuster]

To paraphrase something I'm working on (nominally) at the moment.

I do not focus on the origin or postulated origin of the term IPA, and on what it may have meant initially. This represents one single phase in its existence, while the initial meaning, tentatively reconstructed by later researchers, does not determine later ones.

 

[RobW]

Point taken, but nevertheless IPAs were originally brewed to send to India from England. The Yanks may have copied this later but historically the Poms got in first. BTW any idea what American hops were used in those early brews?

 

[Kai]

To paraphrase something I'm working on (nominally) at the moment.

I do not focus on the origin or postulated origin of the term IPA, and on what it may have meant initially. This represents one single phase in its existence, while the initial meaning, tentatively reconstructed by later researchers, does not determine later ones.

I'm having a bit of trouble translating that, but I'll have a stab:

If enough Americans call a rabbit a duck, then it is a duck, always has been a duck, and always will be a duck.

 

[RobW]

I'm having a bit of trouble translating that, but I'll have a stab:

If enough Americans call a rabbit a duck, then it is a duck, always has been a duck, and always will be a duck.

:lol: :lol: :lol:

 

[Stuster]

Yep, that's it.

Well, more or less. Meaning, whatever the term meant before, it doesn't mean it will always mean that. That's why we speak English rather than Old German or Sanskrit or....

Back nearly on topic, not sure what hops were used used RobW. Could have been early American varieties like Cluster, or could have been English varieties. Most US brewers seem to dislike Cluster. Dutch settlers also brought their own varieties.

 

[tintin]

Not technically an IPA, but a few bottles of this and any dodgy vindaloo will be sorted out quick smart...

(partial mash, 21 litres)
1.5kg Marris Otter
250g TF d/crystal
250g wheat

5.2kg LME

35g chinook @ 80 min
35g amarillo @ 60 min
13g goldings @ 30 min
13g goldings @ 15 min
7g fuggles @ 5 min
13g fuggles @ 0 min

Scottish Ale yeast

A liitle Friday night project! Sorry for lack of O.G., I'm not sure how to predict it as I am merely a grasshopper. Maybe a Grand Massa can direct me to a place of learning.

 

[PostModern]

With regards to recipies it would be good if you could include your estimated original gravity, and batch size.

Seconded. If this thread is to be of any value, I think we all have to adhere to that.

 

[Tony]

will be dry hopping my IPA with plugs.

1 x norhtdown

1 x fuggle.

mmmmmmm cant wait.

cheers

 

[pbrosnan]

Here's my current IPA, been in the fermenter since Saturday @ around 15C which is a bit on the low side for the yeast but it's been cold over here in the West.

Brew 051

A ProMash Recipe Report

Recipe Specifics
----------------

Batch Size (L): 24.00 Wort Size (L): 23.00
Total Grain (kg): 6.39
Anticipated OG: 1.068 Plato: 16.48
Anticipated SRM: 11.7
Anticipated IBU: 74.9
Brewhouse Efficiency: 80 %
Wort Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Formulas Used
-------------

Grain/Extract/Sugar

% Amount Name Origin Potential SRM
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
74.3 4.75 kg. Pale Malt(2-row) Great Britain 1.038 3
15.6 1.00 kg. Hoepfner Munich Malt Germany 1.038 9
7.8 0.50 kg. Wheat Malt Germany 1.039 2
1.6 0.10 kg. Crystal 75L Great Britian 1.034 75
0.6 0.04 kg. TF Black Malt UK 1.033 645

Potential represented as SG per pound per gallon.


Hops

Amount Name Form Alpha IBU Boil Time
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
40.00 g. Fuggle Pellet 5.00 24.9 60 min.
20.00 g. Goldings - E.K. Whole 4.75 10.7 60 min.
20.00 g. Wye Target Pellet 11.00 27.3 60 min.
30.00 g. Goldings - E.K. Pellet 4.75 9.0 30 min.
30.00 g. Goldings - E.K. Pellet 4.75 3.0 5 min.


Yeast
-----

WYeast 1099 Whitbread Ale