APA

Beer Recipes
1

Brewing again tomorrow to try and collect more numbers to baseline my new mash tun.

Thinking of a basic APA. I’m hoping for a crisp, dry beer with a good amount of bitterness. I think this may be bordering on IPA territory, and that’s even more reason for me to try and dry it out.

OG: 1.058
75% Briess Pale Ale Malt
7.5% Weyermann Munich 10L
7.5% Briess Caramel 60L
10% Invert No. 1 syrup

I plan on mashing at 152, I don’t want the beer to be too thin. I’m hoping that the syrup and higher mash temp could work together to make a beer that doesn’t have a thin mouthfeel, yet is still dry?

Hops:

FWH: ~10 IBU Crystal (bitterness calculated as a 20 minute boil addition.)
20 min: 20 IBU Simcoe
20 min: 15 IBU Columbus
Flameout: 1 oz. Cascade

I don’t plan on doing a whirlpool for this beer. I might consider hitting it with an ounce of either simcoe or cascade in the keg.

Yeast will likely be fresh 1450 from the Mild that I’ll also be kegging tomorrow. Should I just rack on top of the old yeast cake? That’s what I did with the mild. Or pour out a measured amount of slurry and use that? This APA would be the third pitch of this 1450.

And thanks to all the folks who help look over recipes, it’s a nice “safety net” to know the beer won’t be horrible.

2

I would probably measure out some slurry using a yeast pitch calculator. Overpitching is supposed to lead to thin tasting beer. I’ve noticed that when tasting FFT samples.

Recently I started using Wyeast 1469 (West Yorkshire - T. Taylor) and open fermenting/top cropping it and it’s been awesome. I’m only a few batches in with it so far but I’m getting a ton of clean healthy yeast off the crop, storing it under beer in a sanitized mason jar, and plan on continuing to use it for all my ale fermentations. Seems to be the best way to keep an ale strain going.

The Belgium’s do the whole using a lot of sugar while still leaving nice mouthfeel thing well. The step mashes they employ may be part of the equation.

3

+1.  You definitely wouldn’t need the whole yeast cake for an APA. Mr Malty’s calc is pretty good for that. Probably more like 1/3 to 1/2 would do great.

4

That’s a great yeast for sure. I have done the same top cropping of 1469 with success. One thing that I and another brewer from another forum noticed is that it seems to stop forming that great croppable mat of yeast in successive generations. I have seen it twice now. The resulting beers were as good if not better than others and they attenuated as expected so I am not convinced it is a problem for anything other than continued top cropping. Just a point of interest and I would be curious to see if anyone else noticed it. Carry on.

5

1/3 of the 1450 slurry will be just about right.

6

Interesting, I’ll post about it if I notice that as well. Wonder if open fermenting will affect it.

7

The Belgians…[emoji6]

8

Out of curiosity is there any reason you are using the crystal for bittering?

9

Kinda just feel like it. It’s descended from hallertau, with some cascade in the lineage as well. I know that some folks like to bitter with noble hops, and figured why not try it?

As far as top cropping 1469, should top cropping lead to a culture that wants to top crop even more? You’re essentially only harvesting the cells that want to crop up the most.

And I still think Fast Fourier Transform whenever I see FFT.

10

Crazy low alpha is the only reason I wouldn’t use it for bittering. I think my current crop is about 2% AA

11

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Interesting, I’ll post about it if I notice that as well. Wonder if open fermenting will affect it.

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Good question, hard to say. I should mention then that none of mine were open fermented.

12

I think the crystal I have is 3.7% AA? It’s from the 2014 crop. I’ve stored it vacuum sealed in the freezer, so it’s still good.

13

Won’t fwh bittering be the same IBU contribution as full boil addition?

14

Testing I’ve done shows about a 10% increase in IBU.  But many people, including myself, think it tastes less bitter than a 60 min. addition, even though it measures higher.

15

Yeah I think Beeralchemy shows it as the same. However OP indicates he’s treating it like a 20 min addition. BA is showing using Tinseth changing a 60 min addition to 20 mins is a 40% reduction in IBU, so that pretty dramatic.

16

I used to calculate FWH as 20 minute additions but now just leave them equal to 60 minute additions. This has helped me to meet my expectations.

17

I treat it as a 20 min. addition also because that’s what it tastes like to me.  Since I drink my beer, not measure it, that’s what’s important to me.

18

I found the biggest difference between 60min and FWH in my helles. I might agree with Denny on it having similar perceived bitterness to a later boil addition, maybe 30-20 min, but not the same flavor. In a really delicate beer, compare a small 60 min bittering to the same amount at FWH. To me the FWH will be a smoother bitterness with a little less flavor, or more rounded flavor. Less aroma too. If you dont think early boil hops contribute aroma, try to eliminate hop aroma and you’ll see that they do. But that another story

19

That’s the current experiment for the podcast.

20

FW hops have been at the top of my list of things to try now that I’ve moved on from BIAB. I’ve tried FWH with BIAB, and never really noticed much of a difference from 60 minute additions in both flavor and bitterness. Keep in mind though, with BIAB once you haul the bag out and add the FW hops you’re very close to boiling.

For the first time with the cooler mash tun, I decided to try treating it as a 20 minute addition. There are enough folks on here I trust using this method, and if I don’t like the results, I’ll just adjust next time.

That being said, I’m considering swapping out the crystal for Saaz. Had an APA at the local brewpu today that was bittered with Saaz, then had c-hops for everything else. It was very good, and very drinkable for a 6% APA.