Citra/El-Dorado IIPA?

I just purchased 12oz of El Dorado hops, as I hear they're quite an interesting west coast IPA style high-AA hop. Almost a candy-like citrus flavor.

That of course immediately made me think about my Citra hops, so why not combine them?

Has anyone else tried this combo? It's kinda rare. I was thinking a rather simple 1.085ish 2-row+C60 DIPA, Citra for bittering, Citra+ElDorado for flavoring, and El Dorado for aroma. Then follow by El Dorado dry hop for about a week.

I usually go for leaf hops with IPAs, but will be using all pellet this time.

Did you end up brewing this? I was thinking of doing something similar. Thanks.

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El Dorado = Watermelon candies with hints of mixed citrus
Citra = Lychee fruit and mango with hints of grapefruit

The fruitiness will definitely overpower using only these two hops. I would advise cutting it with a dank or piney hop like Columbus. Use a lot of Columbus early and mid boil, then pound it out with all three for the aroma steep, and dryhop with only Citra & El Dorado...maybe some Cascade if you have it.

bobbrews said:

El Dorado = Watermelon candies with hints of mixed citrus
Citra = Lychee fruit and mango with hints of grapefruit

The fruitiness will definitely overpower using only these two hops. I would advise cutting it with a dank or piney hop like Columbus. Use a lot of Columbus early and mid boil, then pound it out with all three for the aroma steep, and dryhop with only Citra & El Dorado...maybe some Cascade if you have it.

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Bobbrews, my plan is to use Apollo early and mid boil and possibly even late. I wanted to check with the OP to see how Citra and El Dorado worked together. I have used them both in SMASH IPAs and found them both very assertive, so I wanted to check to see how the two worked together in order to determine if I need to add some Apollo at the end as well.

Apollo is an excellent choice, too. I definitely think mixing all three (with the right hop schedule/amounts, grist selection, and yeast choice) will work out very well.

bobbrews said:

El Dorado = Watermelon candies with hints of mixed citrus
Citra = Lychee fruit and mango with hints of grapefruit

The fruitiness will definitely overpower using only these two hops. I would advise cutting it with a dank or piney hop like Columbus. Use a lot of Columbus early and mid boil, then pound it out with all three for the aroma steep, and dryhop with only Citra & El Dorado...maybe some Cascade if you have it.

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Strongly disagree. Why not keep it a citrus/fruity IIPA? I see no reason to cut it with anything, I think it sounds great as is.

It won't really be all that citrusy. The fruit will overpower. Too many hopbursted homebrewed IPAs end up tasting like fruit juice. Not my cup of tea and I feel that some hop complexity will help an IPA with a one note tropical fruitiness.

bobbrews said:

It won't really be all that citrusy. Too many hopbursted homebrewed IPAs end up tasting like fruit juice. Not my cup of tea and I feel that some hop complexity will help an IPA with a one note tropical fruitiness.

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I still disagree, and I enjoy the fruity hop character (ad think the Citra will play well and balance the El Dorado), but what our palettes enjoy is absolutely subjective, so do what you think you'll enjoy

Well, that is your right Judging by how strongly you disagreed, you probably prefer actual fruit added to your IPAs, too.

But think about all of the flavors/aromas that could be had from the hops other than the typical tropical fruit/grapefruit focus: pine, floral, herbal, earthy, dank marijuana, spicy, berry, orange, lemon, minty, pear, apple, etc etc etc

The majority of the IPAs I've tasted (from homebrewed friends & commercial breweries alike) are full of tropical fruit & grapefruit with the popular Citra or Amarillo hops. There are amazing examples of these IPAs for sure. But I prefer a change of pace sometimes. Mix those flavors up with something interesting that makes your eyebrows raise. Use of Apollo or Columbus here would be perfect for that goal.

I love the dank, piney, marijuana citrusy IIPAs like Pliny & Heady. Easy drinking light floral/herbal/orange IPAs are also good. Many of those types are hard to find commercially or brew at home successfully. Most homebrewers hopburst with fruity hops so much that it often just ends up tasting like pineapple juice to me. If I wanted that, I'd just spike my pineapple juice with vodka and club soda.

It's definitely a matter of taste. I ran some dry hop experiements with El Dorado, and was quite impressed. Citra is my favorite hop and El Dorado is very similar, and IMO absolutely destroys Amarillo as a dry hop. I generally like beers that are bittered with hops like CTZ or Apollo, but use more fruity hops for late additions and dry hopping. Simcoe is probably my second favorite hop, and I personally don't consider it a dank hop like CTZ or Apollo. I would say it's piney and more fruity than a lot of hops that are considered half way between dank and fruity. That being said, I like Simcoe as a late addition and a dry hop, but am not a big fan of using CTZ as a dry hop, and think Apollo is downright disgusting as a dry hop. Anyway, I think bittering with CTZ, Apollo, or other dank hops while using hops like Citra, Simcoe, Centennial, and El Dorado for late additions and dry hops is my ideal flavor. At this point, I'd rate El Dorado up there with Citra, Simcoe, and Centennial, and ahead of a lot of other good hops like Nelson Sauvin and Mosaic. At this point, the only hop I really want to try that I haven't yet is Galaxy.

I did a little dry hop experiment with Citra, El Dorado and Simcoe, as well as mixing them to see what I preferred. Citra and El Dorado are very similar, but there is some difference. I slightly preferred Citra over El Dorado, but my favorite was 50% Citra/50% El Dorado. I have a Galaxy, Green Bullet, and Citra dry hop experiment going now (as well as Polaris, but I don't expect that one to be a winner for dry hopping). I can't say how Citra and El Dorado will work together during the boil, although I seriously doubt it would be that different from just using Citra, but I can say that anyone who likes Citra as a dry hop will definitely like Citra and El Dorado together.

ianmatth said:

Citra and El Dorado are very similar, but there is some difference. I slightly preferred Citra over El Dorado, but my favorite was 50% Citra/50% El Dorado. I have a Galaxy, Green Bullet, and Citra dry hop experiment going now (as well as Polaris, but I don't expect that one to be a winner for dry hopping). I can't say how Citra and El Dorado will work together during the boil, although I seriously doubt it would be that different from just using Citra, but I can say that anyone who likes Citra as a dry hop will definitely like Citra and El Dorado together.

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Just found this thread. First, I brewed a 3gal batch that I split into the boil. Both had Cascade through out (bitter, flavor, aroma) but one had Citra and the other El Dorado. Yeast was plain ol -05. El Dorado was our favorite right out of the gate. The Citra was very catty early. About two weeks later Citra was better, got cleaned up in the bottles. But El Dorado still won. (This purely a side by side critique, as we drank both of them pretty quickly.)

This weekend I did a 3gal partial mash that went Centenial for bitter, Cascade/El Dorado/Citra for flavor and aroma. This one higher IBU, ~60. I haven't decided on dry hopping yet, will wait for 3weeks in primary and decide. My one regret from first split beer was that El Dorado should have been much bigger in that beer. Hoping this one works better for that.