Month: January 2020

West Coast style IPAs are almost a novelty on the east coast these days.  All these soft juicy east coast IPAs leave me craving a good ole bitter West Coast style IPA.  

So here’s my take on a West Coast IPA.  The malt bill consists of 90% Pale Malt, 5% Crystal 20L, 4% Carapils.   But that’s not the important part.   Here come the hops.    41 IBU of Warrior at T-60, 12 IBU of Cryo Citra in the whirl pool, 1oz Azacca & 1oz Simcoe dry hopped for 3 days, and another 1 oz  Azacca in the keg.

The end result?

I’m enjoying the bitter bite and piny/citrus aroma/flavor.  This is a pretty good beer, but honestly I had higher expectations.   I already know what I want to tweak for the next version 😉

I’m normally not a fan of Brown Ales.  However, I’ve found some jazz’d up versions I really like (hello Founder’s Underground Mountain Brown).

So I decided to brew my own jazz’d up Brown.   The malt bill: 78% Pale Malt, 7% Brown Malt, 4% Crystal 120L,  4% Crystal 80L,  4% Chocolate Malt, 3% Special B.

I used Saflager 34/70 to ferment it; which is quickly becoming a favorite.

When fermentation was nearly complete I added 7 grams of coarsely crushed Starbucks Verona coffee beans and 1 teaspoon of Mexican Vanilla Extract (Usumacinta).

I was a bit surprised with the end result.   The coffee is quite prominent and I definitely taste the vanilla is the background.  The color went from brown to nearly pitch black…

I really like this brew 🙂

 

I was hoping to brew a big Belgian Quad inspired brew.   Something north of 9% ABV.   The goal was to age it and keep around for next winter.

Well you know what they say about the best laid plans.   Yes my brew day went a bit awry with this one.   I’ll spare you the details.   Let’s just say this turned out to more like a Dubbel; hence the name “No So Quad”.  

This brew is being naturally conditioned/carbonated with Belgian Candi Syrup in keg.   The glass above was from the excess I conditioned in a 2 liter bottle.

I like the results from the 2 liter bottle so I have high hopes for the keg.  Only time will tell how this one ultimately turns out.