Traditional English IPA

[Barley Water]

Sometime between now and the end of the year I would like to brew a traditional English IPA. My idea of a beer like that would be something with a starting gravity of between 1.060 and maybe about 1.065, roughly 50 IBU's. The hops would be English (EKG, Fuggles, Challenger etc) and I would think it important to get that really cool English bisquet taste in the beer. Anybody have any nifty ideas for a formulation (and for that matter, is my idea of an English IPA all screwed up?)? I notice you guys are using a lot of American C hops but I would rather avoid those in this beer because I'll put it in a contest and I'm afraid that would cause the judges to mark it down a bit. I also like beers like this to be relatively dry so I would at least limit the use of crystal malts but perhaps that isn't the way to go with a beer like this. Anybody out there have any ideas or suggestions?

[Manx Guy]

Hey BW!

Here is one I have chalked up for next month:
(Shamlessly poached from thesimpleone of this very forum)

16 litre batch:
Pale malt - 5kg
EKG 90 min - 100g
Fuggles 90 min - 100g
EKG 5 min - 50g
Gypsum - 1 teaspoon in mash and one in boil

OG around 1.072
IBUs around 130
Not sure what yeast to go with but something high attenuating and not too fruity!

Its very bitter and I had a taste of it when it was about 4 months old when it was entered into a NCB IPA competition - it was drinkable but by all accounts its still improving!
I'm sure there will be many more interpretations to follow...




Guy

[Capn Ahab]

2-4% amber malt will give you a slight biscuit toasty note and also dry the finish out a touch. I used 5% in my last English IPA and it was a shade too much imo. It's still a balancing act with the crystal types though. I went for sweetness without caramel in the form of caramalt at about 7% (I think). The rest was Maris otter.

Styrian goldings can also be used as a (sort of) traditional hop that adds a bit of interest, esp as a dry-hop.

Use an attenuative estery yeast. I used wyeast 1318 London III

Make sure it's English amber malt though, not Belgian, which is more akin to victory/biscuit malt.

[Barley Water]

Thanks for the feedback lads. A couple of related questions; first, is it permissable to use only MO for instance with no character malts at all and secondly, let's say you add just a bit of amber malt (which I agree would taste good and tend to dry the beer out) would that also be permissable in this style IPA? When I make American IPA my favorite forumulation is simply American two row with a smidge of amber malt, would an approch like that work for the English stuff, assuming of course I use English MO etc. I guess what I really want to know is if adding crystal malt is manditory or will a dryer interpreation work ok also? Also, I notice you guys just love to throw tortified wheat in damn near everything you make, assuming maybe a 1/2 pound for a 5 gallon batch what is that going to get me taste wise (interestingly I have been doing this for over 25 years and never used the stuff)? Since I'll likely dry hop a bit, head retention is generally not a problem, at least in my experience.

As far as yeast goes, my plan was to use WLP13 which should also dry things out. My impression is that IPA's should not be sweet since back in the day the stuff dried out going "around the horn", does that make sense?

[TheMumbler]

the national guild of wine and beer judges give the beer style as this:

India Pale Ale OG 50-60
Rich golden to deep copper. Good head.
Hoppy alcoholic and grainy bouquet. Full-bodied, malty and grainy with a prominent hop and a clean bitter farewell. Some residual sweetness to balance the hop.

I think the historical recipes are usually stronger, 100% pale malt and all EKG but whether that matches with what people expect now is difficult to say. That said I don't think that anybody over here would care if you put in a bit of crystal or amber so long as the beer tasted good.

I would definitely use EKG only for an IPA but mainly because I like the hop.

leedsbrew got commended for this one which uses malts other than MO in the Saltaire IPA comp of the NCBA. I can look out my entry if you like but it didn't do as well as Neil's.

I don't know whether Shane (Unclepumble) ever put together the recipes but he has been pretty busy going pro

[WishboneBrewery]

leedsbrew got commended for this one which uses malts other than MO in the Saltaire IPA comp of the NCBA. I can look out my entry if you like but it didn't do as well as Neil's.

I got third place for this http://pdtnc.wordpress.com/2011/12/03/a ... hdown-ipa/
+1 on a bit of Amber malt, 2% is just enough

[seymour]

Here you go Barley Water, I know how you love Chinook. 100% true-to-style English IPA, I swear

http://www.northernbrewer.com/documenta ... ookIPA.pdf

[greenxpaddy]

Personally I would brew it a little less SG.

The world really is your oyster. Don't fall into the EkG/fuggles trap. Be adventurous. I've just found Brewers Gold to be a great hop even for aroma when used to moderation.

Take care on the pitching rate. I think sometimes the US brewers try for too much flavour. My pitching rate is more like 10-12 million/ ml rather than 6 mill/ ml as recommended by Jamil. I think that way you will get a cleaner taste with clear exposure of malt and hops. Not a big fan of too much yeast action in uk styles myself

[Barley Water]

Yeah Seymour, yuk yuk. That is an interresting recipe, even for an American IPA. Actually, if the gravity was pushed up a bit that kit would emulate an Arogant Bastard type beer. I will give you this however, just because it's not my thing those guys have made a small fortune with beers like that so what do I know?

I appreciate the input guys, keep it coming. What I usually end up doing is shamelessly stealing from several sources when putting together receipes. I have damn near every beer recipe book published and when I am doing something new I surf through them all looking for ideas. Of course I am making this so I can enjoy it but I will also put it into a very large competition so I want something that will fit within the guidelines but at the same time have something going which is unique (no sense in doing something that has already been done). Just another thought, have any of you guys considered adjuncts? If IPA's back in the day were highly attenuated, would adding some simple sugars or say corn make any sense to get the beer to dry out? I know I have some jaggery at home and of course I could also cereal mash some corn grits......

[DeGarre]

Barley Water, I suggest you dig out Martyn Cornell's 2 blog entries on his collab beer with Brains where he brewed a malt forward IPA. I have a sort of a clone fermenting at the moment (Colonel Williams IPA). It's all about being malt-forward with no real emphasis on hop aroma.

[Rookie]

When I brew an English IPA I use WLP007.

[Barley Water]

The reason I picked that yeast is because first of all it attenuates more that other English strains and secondly, I plan to use it for a couple of other beers (being cheap and all plus I can avoid making starters if I do a little yeast harvesting as I'm also inherently lazy). I generally try to plan my brewing such that I can get a couple of batches at least out of one tube of yeast (and I especially do that with lagers) and I go from the smaller beers to larger when I do that.

[scuppeteer]

Here you go Barley Water, I know how you love Chinook. 100% true-to-style English IPA, I swear

http://www.northernbrewer.com/documenta ... ookIPA.pdf

What a crap recipe that is, it's got bugger all hops in it!



Hop additions I would go for:
Fuggles @ 60
EKG @ 10
Challenger @1/flameout/steep and also dry hop.

I would be aiming for around 40-50IBU, Notty would also work well to attenuate to help you hit your gravity.
I recently made an Imperial Pale ale and used Pale, Crystal, Munich and Caramalt, lovely full bodied mouthfeel to it and plenty hoppy.