Hoppy

For this brew I’m trying out cryo hops for the first time in this Bracket Brewing “Insert Name” hazy pale ale. This recipe was adapted from a homebrewer who queried bracket brewing on their hazy pale ale recipe.

The grain bill for this beer is mostly pale malt, with a huge 30% of rolled oats and about 5% honey malt to give colour and a slightly sweeter/malty finish.

The hops for this beer are Motueka, Idaho#7 and Cryo Pop, previously known as trial blend TRI2304CR. Recent research suggests that high levels of monoterpene alcohols and polyfunctional thiols in a wort stream can create the conditions necessary for the yeast metabolism of hop-derived compounds, otherwise known as “biotransformation.” This hop blend has been developed to make use of briotransformation and to work as both a single hop or in conjunction with other tropical hop varietals.

Brewing beer at home can be extremely rewarding. There’s no greater satisfaction than reaching a level of proficiency when you can comfortably say “I would pay to drink this in a pub”. However, with certain styles of beer and on a homebrew scale and budget, reaching that level (consistently) can be difficult.

Oxidation is without a doubt one of the biggest banes of my existence (and a lot of other homebrewers out there). It can completely ruin a beer, and you’ll usually only know after brewing, fermenting and spending a huge amount of time and effort. When you reach that final stage and see that you’re beer is darkened in colour, lacks flavour and aroma, and tastes like wet cardboard, the only option is usually to dump it down the drain.

I think this is my 3rd time making this beer, and I’m making it again because I think it’s great hazy ale. In the past, I’ve had issues around oxidation for these hoppy and oaty beers, but now I’m at a comfortable place with controlling oxidation through use of preservatives and techniques like closed transfers. When I ordered this beer, I could only get a hold of golden oat malt, which I decided to use. Due to that, the beer ended up a bit darker than I had hoped, but the taste was actually pretty damn good.

After my last pacific/wheat ale, and success using sodium metabisulfite and ascorbic acid, I’ve decided to take another crack at a Hazy IPA. This beer will feature Nectaron, which I’m trying for the first time, as well as BRU-1 and El Dorado, which I’ve had good results with in the past. As with my other Hazies, I’m aiming for a 2:1 chloride to sulfate ratio, heavy whirlpool and dry hop additions, and I’m looking to reduce oxidation as much as possible. I’ll be closed transferring under pressure and using SMB and ascorbic acid at my terminal dry hop.

In an effort to refine the Stone & Wood clone from this post, I’ve updated the recipe based on the results and inspiration from other sources (see link in notes). For the new batch, I’m adding some flaked wheat to add some more haze, and i’m lowering the percentage of ale malt. I’m also switching to american ale malt, in order to get a lighter colour. Finally, I’m increasing the dry hop to 100g and maintaining IBUs at around 22. I’m also experimenting with ascorbic acid (vitamin C) and sodium metabisulfite (SMB) during the dry hop, in an effort to reduce oxidation.

Decided to have another crack at a hoppy hazy with this recipe from some dude on Facebook. For this brew, I’m trying out suspending the hops in a bag using magnets.. as a final effort to avoid oxidation. Closed transfers don’t seem to be working well enough, and I figured it may be due to opening the fermenter for dry hop additions, so we’ll see how this goes. I kinda screwed it up though because the hop bag is too big for the fermenter headspace.. so now the hops are slightly touching the wort. I’ll try limit the fermentation time of this batch to not drag out the hop exposure. I also forgot to use a Whirfloc tablet, but it might help contribute some slight haze. Ultimate goal of this batch is to just avoid oxidation. I’m also trying liquid yeast for the first time (Bluestone Yeast Co. New England ale strain). Hopefully it goes well, it wasn’t cheap.

This is a recipe I took from Hoppy Days Brewing Supplies (Brisbane), which is a session NEIPA. This beer features low bitterness, heavily fruity/critrus hops and a full body with plenty of high-protein malts. This brew makes use of Verdant IPA yeast, which will aid in creating this hazy, hoppy fruit bomb. Although i’ve brewed this beer before, the first time was a dump due to heavy oxidation. This time around, I’m utilising the Fermzilla 27L to do a pressurised, closed transfer ferment, to avoid any oxidation. Hops will be loaded into the collection container and purged with CO2, to remove any possibility of oxygen getting in.

For my next clone, I’m going to attempt to replicate Ballistic Brewing’s “Hawaiian Haze” DDH Pale Ale. The tasting notes for this beer have been descriped as juicy, pineapple, hoppy and citric. It’s light in colour with a solid haze. The hops used were Citra, Rakau, Pacifica and Mosaic. The malts are pale malt, rolled/flaked oats and rolled/flaked wheat. It has medium bitterness with 30 IBUs and an ABV of 4.6%. Using this information, I plan to make a recipe that replicates the beer as closely as possible.

Grain Bill
-Use of high protein grains such as flaked oats and wheat.
-Marris Otter base, with some wheat malt, flaked oats and flaked wheat

Hops
-Citra, Rakau, Pacifica and Mosaic, targetting 30 IBU in the boil with late additions and a substantial dry hop. The whirlpool should make up majority of the hop boil additions, aiming for 80-85c additions.

Chemistry
-a 2:1 Chloride to Sulfate ratio will accentuate the smooth malt body and not the hops, as they speak for themselves.

This beer was designed to clone Balter’s XPA and be close as possible to the original. The head brewers released the hops they used, but not the grains or yeast. The clone grist consisted primarily of American Pale malt with some wheat and carapils for body/head retention and some cara malt for malty flavour. The water profile was higher in calcium and suflate to accentuate the hops, of which were primarily citrus/fruity. Mash was mid 60’s to increase fermentable sugar content and produce a semi-dry beer using US-05.