Under Hopped Beer

[TriColor 1824]

I seem to have a recurring problem that I've been having with my recipes: I utilize the BeerSmith software when formulating my recipes and try and stay within the style guidelines as indicated by the software. I prefer beer with good mouthfeel and moderate - strong malt backbone and moderately strong hop bitterness. Although my beer has been drinkable, I find that the malt flavor overpowers or dominates the hops despite adequate IBU's. The easy solution would seem to be to continue brewing the same recipe but progressively increase the hopping / IBU's until the desired flavor profile is reached but this would put the IBU's outside the style guidelines as per BeerSmith. My question is why is this happening and is there anything I can do to correct this flavor unbalance and yet stay close to the style guidelines? Below is my latest recipe which might provide a clue:

Summer of Discontent IPA
American IPA
(All grain 5.25 Gallons)

4.5# Blacklands Pale Moon Malt (2 Row)
4.25# Maris Otter Malt
1# White Wheat Malt
1# Red X Best Malz
1# Carapils
0.75# Carastan Malt
0.5# Biscuit Malt
0.25# Victory Malt

5 gallons of well water (very hard) heated to 162F and added to grains in a 10 gallon picnic cooler. Initial temp of mash 148F (I was shooting for 152F.

1 gallon of mash removed, brought to a boil and added back to mash tun about 35 minutes after initial mash in.

I got called out and by the time I returned, the total mash time was 3 hours. pH 5.0 , Iodine starch test negative.

Mash out with 2.5 gallons of 200F water to achieve wort/ grain temperature of 168-169F.

Wort recirculated X15 minutes and then slowly lautered into boil kettle.

Remaining grains slowly sparged w/ 2.75 gallons of 200F water.

Total volume into boil kettle: 7.75 gallons.
Pre-Boil gravity: 1.050

Wort brought to boil w/ the following additions:

Beginning of boil:
0.7 oz. El Dorado Pellets AA 12.8%
0.5 oz. Centennial Pellets AA 10%

45 Minutes into boil:
0.5 oz. Cascade Pellets AA 5.3%
0.3 oz. El Dorado Pellets AA 12.8%
5 tsp. Yeast Nutrient
1 Whirfloc Tablet

At Flameout:

1 oz. Lemon Drop Pellets AA 5.2%
0.5 oz. Cascade Hop Pellets AA 5.3

Cooling commenced 20 minutes after flameout and temperature dropped to ~88F.
Post Boil Gravity: 1.063 Flavor good but on the malty side.

Carboy sealed and refrigerated overnight.

Yeast pitched the next day w/ wort temperature 68F. A 1.89L yeast starter (made w/ Pilzen DME and 1 packet of WLP060 American Yeast Blend) was used. Wort aerated X5 Minutes. Vigorous activity noted w/ in 6 hours. Fermentation temperature stabilized at 66F.

Kegged 30 days later from the primary. Final Gravity: 1.007

Dry Hopped in the keg w/:
1.2 oz. El Dorado Pellets AA 12.8%
1 oz. Lemon Drop Pellets AA 5.2%
0.5 oz. Centennial Pellets AA 10%
0.3 oz. HBC 438 Pellets AA 15.7%

*All the above hops were recently acquired and vacuum sealed.

Kegged @ 13 PSI at 33F.
Keg Tapped two weeks after kegging. Flavor profile as noted above.
IBU's per BeerSmith 57.6 (style guide lines 40-70)
IBU's per Brewer's Friend 64.3

I've brewed several American Amber Ales w/ IBU's in the 40-42 IBU range (style guidelines per BeerSmith 20-40) but the same malty profile seems to predominate.

Thoughts, comments, slings, arrows?

 

[kh54s10]

Thoughts: Try different water. Try a less complex grainbill. I don't know if it would make any difference but try cooler sparge water. I use 168 degrees as BS suggests. It is also argued that the temperature makes little difference.

I am not sure what effect the long mash time would have.

Fresh hops? Stored well?

IBU's is a measurement of bitterness, not flavor. But it looks like your recipe covers both well.

I would start with different water.

 

[TriColor 1824]

Thanks, I will consider changing the water. I've been using this particular water because it comes straight from the aquifer, has no chemicals and is very hard but at this point I'm willing to give anything a try.

 

[brewcat]

Keg sooner. 30 days in the primary and you are losing quite a bit of flameout hoppiness. You might also try utilizing a dry hop in the primary. So try something like: At day 8 in the fermenter dry hop for 5-7 more days. Then you are kegging at two weeks or so.

 

[65C]

I find using Maris gives quite a lot of malt flavour - so if I'm looking for a clearer lighter cleaner taste I sub some or all of it out for Pils - you're also using a lot of speciality grain there

On the hops - aside from the dry ones you've not got a lot going in at the end of the boil if you're trying to get something comparable to a commercial 'hoppy' beer (which may have something like 4oz+ at end and 6oz+ on dry on top of the bittering) - what you're putting in there is what I use and I like my beers quite low hopped

On the water - we have very hard here - I use some lactic acid and ph strips to get it down - takes 7-12ml usually

 

[ncbrewer]

Keep in mind that the IBU calculation is just an estimate and is highly dependent on your system. Your beer might have much lower IBUs than the estimate.

 

[jerbrew]

I agree with above that its a bit of a complicated grain bill. Having biscuit and victory seems a bit redundant and probably covered up by the marris otter and Redx. I've never used Redx but from what I've read here and from a couple SMaSH beers I've had using it, it is a different level of malty than a typical base malt. you may try cutting back on that and find your hopping level is just out of balance with the rest of the recipe. As in, you need more hops because you have a grist providing too much malt flavor/sweetness. A possible grist I would try for the above would be this.

50% 2-row
40% MO
5%RedX
5% Carapils

You'll get the bready flavor from the MO and that malty sweetness from the RedX. If you want more you can alwasy replace some 2-row with more RedX

 

[bleme]

The general rule of thumb is 5% crystal malt in a beer where you want the hops to shine. The recipe above is at 13.2%. With the RedX, Victory and Biscuit on top of that it is going to take alot of hops to break through.

While water could be an issue also, it is hard to tell without getting it tested. I would focus on the malt side first.

 

[TriColor 1824]

Thank you for the above suggestions. I think I am going to boost my hop levels first until I get the desired bitterness. Once I achieve this, I'll start backing off on the malt and see if I can decrease the hops from there. In that way I'm not changing more than one variable at a time and should be better able to pinpoint the cause and potential solution to this problem.