Looking for a lightly hopped IPA recipe.

[Crucial-BBQ]

Anyone have a decent, lightly hopped IPA recipe? I am not into hop bombs or excessively bitter beers. I'm looking for something balanced and at the lower-end of the style guide line; somewhere between a SNPA and a Ship Yard Fuggles IPA (and yeah, I am well aware that many do not like Ship Yard, let alone their IPA. But, I do.).

 

[GusG]

If you don't like a lot of hops or bitter beers why make an IPA? Try a nice Pale Ale.

 

[Crucial-BBQ]

Because I do love hop aroma and flavor, just not to the point of it kicking me in the azz or dominating the profile.

Yes, I could just add a little more bittering hops to an APA, followed by a little dry hopping, but I'm hopping that someone else on here has a recipe for an IPA on the lower end of the style guide line that I can try.

 

[Vance71975]

Anyone have a decent, lightly hopped IPA recipe? I am not into hop bombs or excessively bitter beers. I'm looking for something balanced and at the lower-end of the style guide line; somewhere between a SNPA and a Ship Yard Fuggles IPA (and yeah, I am well aware that many do not like Ship Yard, let alone their IPA. But, I do.).

lightly hopped IPA = Contradiction in terms lol. Honestly what i would do is brew a Standard IPA, But make all of your Hop Additions with 30 mins or less left in the boil, this will give you smooth bitterness and a huge hop flavor and aroma. If you do 1/2 oz additions at 30,20,10,5,and flame out i think you will be right about where you want to.

 

[Irrenarzt]

Exactly. A lightly hopped IPA is not an IPA, it's a pale ale.

 

[david_42]

Sorry guys, but the original IPA was not anything like a PNW hop bomb. The "I" refers to ABV, not hoppiness.

Look for any English IPA recipe. Fewer hops and generally no grapefruit.

 

[Misfit]

I though the "i" refered to India?

 

[stamandster]

Misfit, it does... Indian Pale Ale but there's also IIPA (or DIPA, Doubel IPA) Imperial India Pale Ale. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/India_Pale_Ale -- the background is that the East India Traders needed a stronger beer to survive the trip to India. Supposedly a higher alcohol Pale Ale was created to send. Today the "I" really only symbolizes more alcohol content and hop flavor/aroma than a Pale Ale. An IIPA is similar to an American IPA.

 

[DrinkNoH2O]

Try brewing Dude's Lake Walk Pale Ale, probably the best recipe I've ever found on this site:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f66/lake-walk-pale-ale-32939/

It's a hoppy pale ale, or a weaker IPA.

 

[BigEd]

Anyone have a decent, lightly hopped IPA recipe? I am not into hop bombs or excessively bitter beers. I'm looking for something balanced and at the lower-end of the style guide line; somewhere between a SNPA and a Ship Yard Fuggles IPA (and yeah, I am well aware that many do not like Ship Yard, let alone their IPA. But, I do.).

The type of malt and hops will have a lot to do with the flavor and hop impact of the beer. The reason you may like Shipyard's IPA is that they use British malt and hops. In general the UK malts will have a softer, richer flavor profile compared to the North American products. The UK hops, like Fuggles, also tend to have a less sharp flavor impact than the typical American C Hops. If you put together a simple beer with 95% UK pale malt and 5% UK 55L crystal as the base then use a hop like Challenger to bitter followed by flavor and aroma additions of Fuggles and/or Goldings you should be happy.

Something like this:

9.5 lbs UK pale malt
.5 lb UK 55L crystal malt
Mash @ 151F/66C for 60 minutes

1 oz Challenger ~8%AA @ 60 minutes
1 oz Goldings ~5% @ 30 minutes
1 oz Goldings ~5% @ 5 minutes

Ferment with your favorite British ale yeast, I like London WLP-013 or WY1028.

 

[Misfit]

Misfit, it does... Indian Pale Ale but there's also IIPA (or DIPA, Doubel IPA) Imperial India Pale Ale. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/India_Pale_Ale -- the background is that the East India Traders needed a stronger beer to survive the trip to India. Supposedly a higher alcohol Pale Ale was created to send. Today the "I" really only symbolizes more alcohol content and hop flavor/aroma than a Pale Ale. An IIPA is similar to an American IPA.

Ha I knew this. I guess sarcasm doesn't transfer too well over the interwebs. There are some professional brewers on this site

 

[markg388]

I loved this batch, but in competition it didn't do that well with judge's notes saying "great beer, needs more hop flavor and aroma". Should be right up your alley...

11# weyermann vienna
1.25# crystal 40l
1# domestic munich

.8oz centennial (11%) - 60 min
.5oz each amarillo & centennial - 15 min
.5oz each amarillo & centennial - 2 min

ferment w/ wyeast scottish ale & dry hopped 1oz each centennial & amarillo

 

[flexbrew]

BJCP has American IPA anywhere from 40 to 70 IBU's and an english IPA anywhere from 40 to 60 IBU's. So technically a less hoppy IPA could be one with 40 IBU's.

 

[stamandster]

Ha I knew this. I guess sarcasm doesn't transfer too well over the interwebs. There are some professional brewers on this site

Gotcha...

 

[Crucial-BBQ]

lightly hopped IPA = Contradiction in terms lol. Honestly what i would do is brew a Standard IPA, But make all of your Hop Additions with 30 mins or less left in the boil, this will give you smooth bitterness and a huge hop flavor and aroma. If you do 1/2 oz additions at 30,20,10,5,and flame out i think you will be right about where you want to.

Hahahaha. I guess it is only a contradiction in terms of what you are used to drinking. Then again, I remember a time when people would roll their eyes if one was heard describing an IPA as "beer" since beer was a generic term used to describe something basic like Bud, Miller, etc.

There was a point in time when I would have considered myself a hop head, in particular since IPAs are my favorite style and also in part because I used to be arrogant enough to believe that a high octane IPA was what separated men from the boys. Yeah, I was a beer snob.

Perhaps my tastes have changed, matured, or that I "grew up", but I have come to appreciate a more balanced beer. Not to sweet, not to bitter. Not lawn-mower, but not going to put you on the floor. One top of that, I like a nice hop aroma (actually, I love it) and flavor, but nothing that distracts from the malt and bitterness (well, as far as flavor is concerned).

So, I'm looking at around 6% ABW (or is that ABV? I've always got the two confused ), a balance between malt/bitterness (but leaning slightly towards bitter. Just slightly), just dry enough to notice, and more hop flavor than a typical PA/APA, but not over-powering, and a nice hop aroma.

Is that too much to ask for?

I never thought about doing all my hop additions late. I've been toying around with doing between .5 oz and 1.0 oz @ 60 minutes to get a base bitterness of around 35, then doing later additions starting around 30 minutes to bump up the IBUs to 45 to 50 or so. I'll try all late additions sometime in the near future.

Here is what I brewed a few days ago (last Friday):

5 gallon batch (actually ended up with 4.5 gallons in fermentor)

10.5 #s American 2-Row
0.5 # Crystal 60
0.5 # Cara-Pils

0.5 oz Summit @ 17.8 aa @ 60 minutes
0.25 oz Summit @ " " @ 30 minutes
0.25 oz Summit @ flameout

Mashed @ 152 for 60 minutes
60 minute boil

OG 1.056

Pitched US-05

I never used Cara-Pils, nor Summit. I am trying the CP out of curiosity and I only used Summit as I never had that particular hop (to my knowledge) and the idea of only using 1 oz seemed appealing, so I am looking to get an idea of it's flavor profile with my system, but this should give you an idea of what I am aiming for.

I will try the recipes that others have posted, perhaps just doing maybe a 2 gallon batch of each.