GrainFather Recipes - Colour Codes? Different Types of Hops

[Michael Lindemann]

Hello,

As a complete newbie, I'm getting a bit confused when I read all the recipes everywhere and then trying to find a supplier who has all this available.


I've been looking at GrainFather recipes, i.e https://community.grainfather.com/recipes/56261 and you can see that they have listed the hops and there are two different colours.

Can someone explain what this means? Are they different types of Cascade hops? (I assume we can use any cascade hop and just figure out which ones work best for us?).

This one here, for instance, has multiple different colours: https://community.grainfather.com/recipes/3



When I check out the recipes in this forum, such as https://www.homebrewtalk.com/forum/threads/hoppy-session-wheat-beer.644047/ it just mentions for instance
Hops - 1 ounce Centennial
- So if I were to find a supplier of Centennial hops, I'm pretty much good to go? (plus the other ingredients)




Thanks

Michael

 

[VikeMan]

Cascade hops are Cascade Hops. Centennial Hops are Centennial Hops. Any hop will have variable alpha acid percentages by harvest and the yard it was grown in. You should adjust any recipe for those differences.

I don't know what the Grainfather color codes are, because you need an account to log in. Do you brew on a Grainfather system? If not, I'm guessing that looking through Grainfather recipes is of little value. Just a hunch.

 

[Michael Lindemann]

Thanks VikeMan .. yeah I got the GrainFather, but instructions were not really that helpful and I want to have it somewhat figured out in my head before using it. Below is how the hops section looks (sorry, forgot that I could paste in here).

And then another a different recipe:

So I would have thought the colour coding must mean something ..
But no one else, like on here uses it I guess..

 

[VikeMan]

It looks like the colors may be related to the IBUs. i.e. the higher the IBU contribution of that particular addition (which is driven by AA%, hop amount, and time in boil), the darker the color of the icon.

 

[myndflyte]

Yeah, there aren't different varieties of the same hops. I mean maybe but not available to the general public. But I agree, the color seems to signify the IBUs. As for buying stuff, there are many online homebrew sites that sell grain, malt extract, hops, yeast and whatever else you might need. If you are looking for something less mainstream like those Riwaka hops, you may need to go to a more specialized store like Yakima Valley.