West Coast IPA - Dirty Harry

West Coast IPA - Dirty Harry

A friend and I went halves in a bunch of hops, mostly hops I hadn't really used too much before.  I figured the last few beers I had made were all pretty similar, juicy IPA's with my usual hops, Galaxy, Mosaic, Simcoe or Citra so lets try something different.

Having recently been at Little Bang Brewery for a few beers and having a couple of pints of their Naked Objector I knew I needed something like this on tap.  For me it ticked all the boxes, it was bitter, and not too sweet and a awesome orange color with head for days.

So based on this beer the hops we ordered were some of the more old school hops:

• 1kg of Centennial
• 1kg of Amarillo
• 1Kg of Chinook

Having never really used any of the above in my beers before except for Amarillo I decided to chuck them all in the mix.  So with a shitload of hops to play with I went about putting a recipe together that would hopefully tick all the boxes.

The Chinook would hopefully give some nice pine and resinous notes.  The Centennial hopefully some spicy citrus and the Amarillo some more citrus notes.  I used Columbus for bittering as I had exactly 20g left from a previous brew and its usually my go to for bittering.

Recipe:

West Coast IPA

OG 1.057

EBC 12.5

IBU 73

ABV 6%

FG 1.011

Fermentables:

5.5kg Ale Malt (90%)

400g Wheat Malt (7%)

200g Medium Crystal (3%)

Yeast:
Wyeast 1056

Mash:

Mashed at 65 degrees C for 60mins

Raised to 75 degrees for 10mins

Boil:
Boiled for 60mins

Hops:

Columbus 20g (16.6AA) 31.8IBU @ 60mins

Centennial 15g (9.8AA) 8.5 IBU @ 20mins

Amarillo 15g (8.8AA) 7.6 IBU @ 20mins

Centennial 50g (9.8AA) 7.7 IBU @ Hopstand once cooled to 80 degrees for 20 mins

Amarillo 50g (8.8AA) 6.9 IBU @ Hopstand once cooled to 80 degrees for 20 mins

Chinook 50g (13.2AA) 13.2 IBU Hopstand once cooled to 80 degrees for 20 mins

Fermentation:
Fermented at 18degrees C for the first 4 days then raised up to 20 to finish it off.

Dry Hops:

Centennial 20g (9.8AA) @ Day 2

Amarillo 20g (8.8AA) @ Day 2

Chinook 20g (13.2AA) 1@ Day 2

Centennial 30g (9.8AA) @ Day 6

Amarillo 30g (8.8AA) @ Day 6

Chinook 30g (13.2AA) @ Day 6

Not the greatest picture, but since the keg is done this is all I have.

Tasting:

So how did this turn out?  It was good, not great.  It was what I was after I guess, lots of bitterness and plenty of pine and resin from the Chinook with a slight sweetness from the crystal malt.  However definitely wasn't a Naked Objector.

It wasn't thin which was good, it tasted like you were drinking a big beer with good body.  So a West Coast IPA?  I think it was the hop combo that just wasn't doing it for me, it was quite subdued, not jumping out of the glass like my previous beers.

Looking back at it I think I am just used to be spoiled with the hops like Citra, Galaxy and Mosaic where the aroma jumps from the glass.  I shouldn't have been expecting this with the hops I used for this one.

I ended up calling it dirty harry because it was big, bitter and kicked your arse, after a couple of pints you knew you had been drinking an IPA.  While not being great it still didn't last long on the tap, I think the longer it had to sit in the keg and settle the better it got, the flavors of the hops had time to mellow out together.  I think my biggest issue is be patient with my beers and getting into them too quickly.  I need to learn some restraint and give them time to settle out.

Changes for next time?  Well I would change up the malt bill.  Drop the crystal for some Maris, Vienna or maybe some Golden Promise and add some Munich I.  Hops?  Well maybe just use the Chinook hot side and keep the Amarillo and Centennial for the dry hops as to not muddle the flavors up to much.

I'll see what hops I have left over from my bulk buy in the coming weeks to see if I revisit this one.