I got the green light for a brewday on Sunday morning, so I set the kit up and weighed the grain the night before to ensure an early start. I had five hours to get this done and cleared away (ended up being nearer 6). This was a rebrew of my Tomahawk IPA AG#9 and AG#15. My aim was to brew a similar beer, but as this is one of my two recipes in development I tried a couple of different things with it. Having just bought Mitch Steele‘s IPA book, I couldn’t resist tinkering. The first was to tweak the grain bill, upping the quantity of caramel malts. To date I have used a combination of Pale, Munich, Pale Wheat and a small quantity of Caramalt in my IPAs, but wanted to experiment, so out with the Pale Wheat Malt and in with some Crystal 60L.
The second change was to the hopping, sticking with Pilgrim for bittering and with Columbus as the late copper hop. I previously brewed with Cascade in there too so kept that. I added Chinook to the bill which I hope will tame the Tomahawk down a notch. As well as the slight change to hop varieties I wanted to structure the schedule, as per a Deschutes recipe (Inversion IPA) in the Steele book. I want a beer with 80 IBUs or thereabouts that isn’t harsh, and as I wasn’t sure how that would work it seemed a sensible idea to use a Deschutes recipe (Inversion IPA) as a guideline for hop addition rates. I based my recipe on their 5.8g/l , which worked out at 133g, added to the kettle as follows: 15% at the start of the boil, 25% at 30 minutes and 60% at 5 minutes. For the dry hops, Deschutes use 1.16g/l which works out at 30g. This seems a bit low, but as those hops will be Columbus, Chinook and Cascade then they should still give it a bit extra on the aroma.
Original Gravity (OG): 1.062
Final Gravity (FG): 1.012
Alcohol (ABV): 6.7%
Colour (SRM): 9.3 (EBC): 18.4
Bitterness (IBU): 80.0 (Average)
5.000 kg (82%) Golden Promise Pale Malt
0.600 kg (10%) Caramalt
0.370 kg (6%) Munich
0.120 kg (2%) Crystal 60L
20g Pilgrim (11.2% Alpha) @60 minutes from the end (boil)
33g Columbus (14.5% Alpha) @30 minutes from the end (Boil)
10g Cascade (7.9% Alpha) @5 minutes from the end (Boil)
10g Chinook (12.5% Alpha) @5 minutes from the end (Boil)
60g Columbus (14.5% Alpha) @5 minutes from the end (Boil)
10g Cascade (7.9% Alpha) in secondary for 3 days (dry hop)
10g Chinook (12.5% Alpha) in secondary for 3 days (dry hop)
10g Columbus (14.5% Alpha) in secondary for 3 days (dry hop)
Water treatments: Campden tablet (HLT), 1 tsp gypsum (mash). My weighing scales aren’t great and I only need 3-4g, which is a tsp (approx). Same rule for the epsom salts in the boil.
Strike temp of 76C, 15.2L liquor for 6.090kg grain. Mashed in at 68C, a degree higher than my target as my mash tun loses a bit of heat (single step infusion). Mashed for 60 minutes and temp dropped to 67. Sparged at 78C (strike temp should have been 88C, error), 19L liquor. The boil was scheduled for 60 minutes. All went to plan, Pilgrim in at 60 minutes (from the end of the boil), followed by additions at 30 minutes and 5 minutes. No steeped hops after flame out on this occasion.
I collected 21L of wort post boil with SG of 1.062. Pitched US-05 at 18C. Once I get back to the point of being able to plan ahead, I’ll brew a few more beers with liquid yeast. I’ll be transferring to secondary and dry hopping with Columbus, Cascade and Chinook.
Updated 09/01/13 – SG 1.032
broadfordbrewer 
Hey, This recipe looks good in the process of putting together a recipe for an ipa, based around centennial and citra. Where did you get you Crystal 60L from?
Cheers, loving Centennial but I have none in my freezer at the moment. The Crystal 60 was from the malt miller. It’s a bit old to tell the truth as I hardly ever use the stuff. It says EBC50-70.
Crystal 60L is not the same as 60EBC crystal… it is roughly equivalent to our Crystal 120EBC (which is standard crystal).
60EBC Crystal is roughly equivalent to Crystal 30L (“light crystal”).
Re: time on yeast – anything up to two weeks should be fine in practice – as long as your yeast is healthy, and at a sensible temperature, then you won’t get autolysis in that time frame. Secondaries are OK for dropping yeast out and or maturing (think conditioning tank) – but I’m unconvinced that it makes much difference in homebrew conditions.
Autolysis is an odd “meaty”, marmite, taste often with an umami-like characteristic – is that what you had? I’ve not managed to get that off-flavour in my beer yet….
Thanks Graeme, useful stuff. Such a school boy error on the 60L, but then again I am new at this.
It wasn’t the off flavour you describe, more solvent/hot alcohol, with yeasty flavour too.
With your’s and Ade’s feedback I won’t transfer to secondary for dry hopping. Cheers, appreciate the comments.
Crystal 60L is not the same as 60EBC crystal… it is roughly equivalent to our Crystal 120EBC (which is standard crystal).
60EBC Crystal is roughly equivalent to Crystal 30L (“light crystal”).
Re: time on yeast – anything up to two weeks should be fine in practice – as long as your yeast is healthy, and at a sensible temperature, then you won’t get autolysis in that time frame. Secondaries are OK for dropping yeast out and or maturing (think conditioning tank) – but I’m unconvinced that it makes much difference in homebrew conditions.
Autolysis is an odd “meaty”, marmite, taste often with an umami-like characteristic – is that what you had? I’ve not managed to get that off-flavour in my beer yet….
Good stuff, is the transfer to secondary just to minimize the time on the yeast?
That’s my thinking, but happy to be told otherwise?
all my dry hopping has been done in the primary without issue, I like to keep thinks simple so less chance of infection etc.
Right, that helps, I won’t be messing about transferring to dh. Cheers.