Beefing up OG

[slcdawg]

I'm going to brew an IPA partial mash kit. When I plug the recipe into BeerSmith it comes up with an OG of 1.056, which is on the low part of the range for an IPA. If I add a lb of 2 row, the OG hours up to a respectable 1.061.

So far I have just followed recipes. Can I simply add a lb of 2row to give it more body? Or is there more to it?

 

[SagamoreAle]

If you add the (milled) grain, you will increase your OG.

Body is a somewhat different issue. If you want more body, increase your mash temperature or use less water in the mash. However it sounds like you care more about OG.

 

[slcdawg]

Ah, so OG just affects abv? Not body?

 

[slcdawg]

I'm looking to increase the hops from 42 to 62 IBUs, and want to balance out the malt. I thought to add 2 row, but sounds like that isn't what I want. ..

My thoughts were if the IBUs went up, I would want the og to have middle of the range as well

 

[Yooper]

Ah, so OG just affects abv? Not body?

Well, a pound of grain is negligible anyway. But adding more grain affects the entire beer- the balance of the hops to the malt, to amount of ABV, and yes, the body.

 

[Stocktonbrew]

By mashing more grain, your OG will go up. If you want to enhance the body, you can also add a half pound of carapils malt. If you still want more ABV throw in a pound of honey.

 

[slcdawg]

Maybe my question of increasing OG is not correct. My goal is to balance out the hop addition. I have a partial mash kit designed for a 3 gallon boil. I'm going to do a full gallon boil, which will up the IBUs. Was thinking that adding 1 lb of 2-row would balance it.

 

[WoodlandBrew]

If you keep the BU:GU ratio the same the beer will be about as balanced. So if you up the grain 10%, then up the IBU's 10%.

 

[slcdawg]

Sorry, what do BU and GU stand for?

 

[WoodlandBrew]

Sorry, what do BU and GU stand for?

BU is buttering units, measures in IBUs.
GU is the original gravity measured in gravity units

It's a ratio that Ray Daniels came up with to describe the malt hop balance of a beer.

Although, Like Yooper said, 1 lb isn't a big change. You can probably leave the hop schedule as is and the beer will come out just as well.

 

[WesleyBrewViking]

If your only objective is to balance the extra hops with more malt flavours, there are a lot of ways you could achieve this, but the end result could be quite different. Here's a handy little chart to use as a reference for the whole BU:GU thing: http://www.mashspargeboil.com/wp-content/uploads/hopsgraph.jpg. It's a good starting point, but it doesn't take all the factors into account, such as what amount of fermentables vs unfermentables are contributing to your OG.

Adding honey will boost your OG (and subsequently your ABV) but you'll end up with a dry beer, which may not be as effective at balancing the hops. LME or DME are a quick and easy way to add maltiness. A little bit of the lower SRM caramel/crystal malts can go a long way to add body and malt character with very little effect on the ABV.

Those are just my dos centavos.

 

[slcdawg]

Cool, thanks for the info! The orig recipe has OG of 1.056 with 42 IBUs which is Extra Hoppy on the chart. If I do a full boil, I'll have 60 IBUs and will need a gravity of 1.070. I can get that with 2 more lbs of LME.

If I wanted to use grain instead of extra pale LME, what grain should I use?

The current recipe is 3.5 lbs 2-row. 0.5 lbs Crystal 40, 0.5 lbs Crystal 60 and 5 lbs LME. Should I maintain the ratio of the grain and add the amount to get to 1.070?

 

[WesleyBrewViking]

If you have the extra room in your kettle for another 2.5 lbs of 2-row, I'd go that route, personally. It's cheaper (unless you're getting gouged on grain) and not really any more complicated since you're already mashing grain. I guess it depends on whether your kettle can hold it all. You could probably just leave the crystal malts the way they are, I certainly wouldn't add 2.5 lbs of crystal.

Have you tried this kit before, without any modifications? If you haven't, it's hard to know if your changes are making an improvement or not. I'm not saying not to - I don't think I've ever followed someone else's recipe exactly the way it was written.

 

[slcdawg]

I haven't tried this one before. I switched to full boil a few batches ago, and have been cutting hops to maintain the IBUs. Since this recipe was light on IBUs, I thought I'd up it. .. but I better balance it out with some extra malt.