IPA I just brewed isn't all that good

[TheArmada]

I would like for you guys to critique my recipe.

I am starting to get a hold of this brewing thing and have done some good beers so far, but I have to be honest it feels like this IPA I just cracked open tastes like sh.... Perhaps I just don't like IPAs ?

1.5 Gal batch
OG was 1.049
It was a 75 minute boil

I used:
3.39 lbs of Wheat Malt
1.07 lbs of Pale Malt
0.35 lbs of Honey Malt
0.29 lbs of Crystal Malt

I added:
0.8 oz of Nugget (9%) at 25 mins
0.4 oz of Fuggle (4.9%) at 65 mins
1 tblsp of Coriander at 75 mins
3 tblsp of White Sugar at 75 mins

Classic homebrew mash and fermented for 2 weeks + 1 full week in the bottle.

Color comes out pale-ish brown almost red I really wanted a darkish blonde here.

 

[Yooper]

It is a pretty poor recipe, and I know I wouldn't like that beer either if that makes you feel any better!

 

[TheArmada]

It is a pretty poor recipe, and I know I wouldn't like that beer either if that makes you feel any better!

Too much wheat malt ? Poor choice of hops ?

 

[neosapien]

I would say it looks like it lacks direction. What were you going for other than just a dirty blonde IPA? Mouthfeel? Sweetness? Dry finish? What kind of hop character?

What were the reasons for each of the ingredient choices you made?

 

[Glynn]

was this a belgian ipa?

next time use only pale malt and a hint of light crystal (10/20L) If you want a little wheat thats fine too. take out the coriander and use the nugget to bitter then add a hop at 15, 0 then dry hop. most people only use about .25lb of honey malt in a 5 gal batch because of it sweetness

 

[Yooper]

Too much wheat malt ? Poor choice of hops ?

Yes, to both.

And the malt bill has too much sweet stuff. The coriander is more than odd, and LOTS of it. It's just all sort of a mess- English finishing hops, too much honey malt, too much crystal malt, not enough base malt (barley) and too much wheat.

Wheat beers have a distinct sour taste to me, and I hate them myself. But a little bit is great for head retention in a batch.

I don't understand the hops schedule, with 25 minute hops (or are those 50 minute hops?) and I think the hops schedule is written incorrectly but even so the hops are too little flavor/aroma and too weird to be an IPA. The OG is also too to balance enough hops for an IPA.

It's just not an IPA recipe at all, and it's not a good balance of flavors for any beer style really.

 

[brewtus_]

Try this for a 1.5 gallon batch and a 60 minute boil:

3.5# Pale
0.25# 60L Crystal
0.125# Wheat
0.125# CaraPils

0.25 oz Chinook (13%AA) for 60 minutes
0.75 oz Cascade (6%AA) for10 minutes
0.75 oz Cascade at flameout/whirlpool

0.50 oz Cascade dry hop for 10 days

Assuming 65-70% mash efficiency, this should make a decent middle of the road American IPA.


Edit to add that based on your original recipe's grain bill and OG, your mash efficiency is way too low (like around 40%).

 

[Calder]

Ouch Yooper ... don't pull any punches.

Yooper pretty much summed it up.

To me, both the Honey malt and Coriander (individually) would be too overpowering, at that level, in any beer to be tolerable.

The rest, I guess you could say is a beer, but not an IPA.

Did you really only get 1.049 OG from 5 lbs of malt and 3 ozs of sugar in 1.5 gallons. If you only got that, I think you need to take a look at your mash procedure. With a decent efficiency you could get 2X that; you might have some water to boil off, but in 75 minutes, that should not be a problem with that size batch.