Think I have made an IPA (30 June '07)

[Alton_Bee]

Yesterday I made Pithead Bitter from Marc Ollosson's Book - Page 139

I used the grain bill and hop quantities as listed although the AA were different.

Marc lists the AA as Fuggles at 3.3% and Goldings at 4.0%. The hops I used were 4.6% and 5.2%.

On plugging these into Promash it came out at 93.2 IBU's against Marc's total of only 30.

Given that there is not that much difference between those listed and what I used I am surprised at the actual differnce in the IBU's.

Has my Promash somehow mis-calculated the IBU's or is there another reason ??

For your info the grain bill was:

Pale Malt - 4640gms
Crystal - 350gms

Am using 2 pkts of Nottingham Dry Yeast to ferment it.

I ended up with an OG of 1.055 giving me 86% efficiency.

[SteveD]

Keep it two or three months, it'll mellow out a bit.

[mysterio]

There are several hop utilization formulae and no one calculation is right. The trick is to pick one and stick with it. If this beer was too bitter, scale back the IBUs next time but dont change the IBU formula or bitterness will be a guessing game.

[oblivious]

I agree with SteveD!

[SteveD]

There are several hop utilization formulae and no one calculation is right. The trick is to pick one and stick with it. If this beer was too bitter, scale back the IBUs next time but dont change the IBU formula or bitterness will be a guessing game.

What, more than it is already?

[Alton_Bee]

Keep it two or three months, it'll mellow out a bit.

As I suspect it is now an IPA I was thinking of leaving it for upto a year to mellow out

[SteveD]

Keep it two or three months, it'll mellow out a bit.

As I suspect it is now an IPA I was thinking of leaving it for upto a year to mellow out

Hang on a sec. It's a bit on the low in IBU and gravity to necessitate keeping a year. We're getting something between 64 and 90IBU? and OG1055. The original style IPA's that do need keeping that long, say 12-18 months, are in the 160IBU and OG1070 region. So I doubt wether you'd need to keep it that long. Also, what alpha acid values are you using? From a book, or from the pack? The book is a total guess, the pack value is at harvest so the actual value WILL be lower, how much by depending on age, storage temperature, and method of packing. Promash has an IBU calculator which will do this for you. So, your beer may not be as over the top as you think.

Try it at 3 months and if it still tries to strip your mouth lining try it again at 4 months. I think you'll find it fine by then or thenabouts. Don't forget that some American Hophead brewers brew their interpretations of IPA with bitterness in the 90IBU area AND drink them young. They either don't get the premise behind the high hop rates in original IPA, or just like it EXTREEEME Man!!. I think, the latter.

[Alton_Bee]

Steve,

I got the AA values from the packaging on the hops used which had been brought the day before from Farnborough.

I got my reading of 94 IBU when plugging the recipe into Promash.

My thoughts of keeping it for a year was just an initial knee jerk reaction. I will probably bottle some of this brew and hide it away - Maybe I will bring some along to the NHBC meeting at the end of September !!

Am now also thinking of possibly using say 10 - 15 gms of Goldings for dry-hopping in secondary.

[SteveD]

Steve,

I got the AA values from the packaging on the hops used which had been brought the day before from Farnborough.

I got my reading of 94 IBU when plugging the recipe into Promash.

My thoughts of keeping it for a year was just an initial knee jerk reaction. I will probably bottle some of this brew and hide it away - Maybe I will bring some along to the NHBC meeting at the end of September !!

Am now also thinking of possibly using say 10 - 15 gms of Goldings for dry-hopping in secondary.

When you bought them isn't the issue, but when they were harvested. If it's Youngs (Morris Hanbury) Gold blocks, it'll have the harvest year on the pack(for that read september for northern hemisphere hops) which will be 2005 or 2006. so they'll be 21 months old or 9 months old. Plug that age into promash and see what happens. I'd guess an average storage temp of 10c, and vacuum/O2 barrier/lightsafe packaging. I bet the AA value is down a quarter to third at least.

I bet you didn't adjust for age.....

I'm sure it'll be ok for the end of sept meeting.

AND dry hops....you're a glutton for punishment, Vic

[Alton_Bee]

I bet you didn't adjust for age.....

Your right Steve - I didn't adjust for age and having now done so I now get a IBU total of 54.9 !!

[SteveD]

There you go. Not so extreme