Getting closer to what I want. #2 turned out very similar to Mirror Pond but more body and bite. I’m bumping the bitter hops tomorrow and changing from cascade for late addition
@ klickitat jim - What is your typical BU/GU on your IPAs? Do you use that ratio to track the movement of the bitterness up or down, or do you just add hops until it tastes right? Mine are right around 1.200-ish (BeerSmith using Tinseth) and while I personally think that’s pretty high, I could still see a little more bitterness as being welcome in my IPAs.
Is there a certain IPA that you are trying get close to? Or are you going for one you will call your own?
I have recently started investigating the IPA trail here as well and have been sampling as many different ones my local liquor store has and also look anything different when traveling to different parts of the country. West coast, midwest, east coast. Quite the variance and ALL good. It’s not so easy picking one favorite.
If you have a BU:GU ratio that high and your still looking for a little more bitterness you could try bumping your sulfate up way way high. like 250-300ppm
Not trying to clone per se, just design my own house recipe. I’ll still be playing around but I want good IPA, APA, and Blonde recipes that are worth repeating.
The last batch had plenty of malt so I cut from 3# Munich to 2. It was too common on hop flavor aroma so I dropped the cascade and went Amarillo mosaic. Bitter was getting close so I added a half oz of Simcoe
Calcium and sulphate are both helpful for not only the hop character/bitterness, but also calcium is needed for a healthy fermentation. Calcium can aide in beer clarity as well.