I just started homebrewing this year and all my batches so far were extract+specialty grains. The first batches were 5 gallon each, I recently moved to 2X 1 gallon batches for side-by-side comparisons, and now I'm looking into 2L (less than 1/2 gallon) batches, mostly to try different types of hops. A few questions:
- Does anyone have experience with such tiny batches? Any special points to consider?
- I'm considering buying a 13 hops sampler and brewing 4~5 batches at a time. Any recommended order?
- To get comparable results I plan to calculate a certain target bitterness, e.g. 30 IBU (Tinseth), and change the ratio between 60 minutes boiled hops and, say, 5 minutes boiled hops so that I achieve the same bitterness with a single type of hops. Makes sense? Should I also add some hops 1 minute before finish?
- To reduce complexity around the hops and to get the results quicker it would probably make sense to avoid specialty grains and stick with pale LME and ale yeast (e.g. US-05). Should I still add some specialty grains to ensure the resulting beer is also enjoyable to drink? The main goal here is to learn about the differences between different types of hops, but I do plan to actually drink this beer
Thanks in advance!
- Does anyone have experience with such tiny batches? Any special points to consider?
- I'm considering buying a 13 hops sampler and brewing 4~5 batches at a time. Any recommended order?
- To get comparable results I plan to calculate a certain target bitterness, e.g. 30 IBU (Tinseth), and change the ratio between 60 minutes boiled hops and, say, 5 minutes boiled hops so that I achieve the same bitterness with a single type of hops. Makes sense? Should I also add some hops 1 minute before finish?
- To reduce complexity around the hops and to get the results quicker it would probably make sense to avoid specialty grains and stick with pale LME and ale yeast (e.g. US-05). Should I still add some specialty grains to ensure the resulting beer is also enjoyable to drink? The main goal here is to learn about the differences between different types of hops, but I do plan to actually drink this beer
Thanks in advance!