Simply Beer IPA (all grain) Brewing Session

After brewing the Dogfish Head 60 Minute extract clone with a friend for him, selfishly, I really wanted my own batch.  So the other day I brewed what I hope to be a kind of hybrid English/American IPA.  I’m hoping for the spiced malty back bone with a very floral American IPA aroma.

Before you start, get your yeast starter going.  I used American Ale yeast I cultivated from the Dogfish head 60 minute Organic clone.  I had about a liter starter for this beer, but only used about half.

The Grain Bill:

• 10.5 lbs Domestic 2 row
• 0.5 lbs Caramel 40

Mash (single infusion):

1.25 quarts of water per pound of grain.  Heat up water to 170° to get to a mash temp of 152°.  Mash grains for 60 minutes.

Sparge:

Heat 5 gallons of water to 170° (not over 170°), collect dirty wort until it runs clean and add it back to the mash.  Slowly get about 1-2 inches of water over the grain bed and slowly begin to collect the wort in the boiling kettle.  You want to collect 6 gallons of wort.  I sparged for about 70 minutes for this batch.

Boil Schedule:

• 2 oz Cascade Hops
• 1 oz Willamette Hops
• .5 oz Amarillo Hops
• 1 oz UK Kent Goldings Hops

When the wort starts to boil, add the 2 oz of Cascade hops to start the 60 minute boil.  Watch for a boil-over they can be pretty nasty to clean up.  I boiled over just at the wort came to a boil, luckily no hops had been added.  So after reducing my burner down to low to maintain the boil, I added the Cascade hops.  30 minutes in add the Willamette hops, from 15-10 minutes remaining keep adding the Amarillo hops.  With 2 minutes remaining add the Kent Goldings.

After cooling the wort and taking your Hydrometer reading add the yeast.  your Original Gravity should be around 1.058-1.060.

Fermentation Schedule:

Ferment in primary for 7 days then move to dry hop secondary.  In the secondary add 1 oz of Amarillo leaf hops and about an oz of Oak Chips (be sure to boil them first).  Keep them in the secondary for 11-14 days and move to a 3rd ferementer to filter out any hops sediment and the oak chips.  Let sit for another week and then Keg or Bottle.

Enjoy!