In Review #4: ‘oops, the yeast vial…’ IPA (homebrew)
a quick update on Emma’s holiday brown ale: we’re down to 1.020 a week into fermentation. This works out to approximately 4%ABV. I’m hoping to get to about 5, but we’ll see what happens. It smells delicious, but the flavor has some clarifying to do. I’ll leave it in the primary for another 2 weeks before bottle conditioning for another three.
You might remember that we brewed this IPA back in September. The name came from dropping the yeast vial into the carboy while pitching the yeast. Drunk + foaming vial = bad hand coordination. There are only about 18 bottles left, which makes me very very sad as this is definitely the best homebrew to date.
Aroma: Hops, hops, hops. There’s a gentle citrusy smell, but it carries some of the malt up with it. A little bit of bananas, which is also in the taste–probably fermented a bit hot as we had some oddly warm days those weeks of September. There’s a bit of toasted caramel around the edges.
Appearance: This beer was my first attempt at using irish moss as a fining agent at ~10min during the boil. There was a tremendous amount of precipitate in the carboy, but this beer is still fairly cloudy. I’m willing to chalk it up to not being able to do a full boil, adding LME sporadically during the boil, and not having any cooling apparatus to facilitate a rapid cold break. Carbonation is also somewhat inconsistent. Some bottles pour with an excessive amount of foaming, while some pour “normally.” Generally the head settles to just a dusting across the surface of the beer. The color of the beer itself is a beautiful mahogany; probably well within the high twenties on an SRM chart. It’s decently clear, but nothing beyond the glass is readable like a commercial brew might be.
Flavor: Bitter grapefruit is the predominant flavor. There’s a deep, deep bitterness to this beer that I feel is almost balanced by toasty malt flavor. Some estery flavor.
Mouthfeel: The IPA starts with a refreshing crisp, citrus flavor that we had in the aroma. The crispness broadens to a full bitterness with toasty malt notes that lingers long after you swallow. Carbonation levels are great, even in the bottles that pour with an excessive amount of head. For being about 8%, there’s very little alcohol bite.
Overall Impression: This is by far the best beer I’ve brewed to date. There are obvious areas for improvement. I’d like for the finish to be a little more dry. I might also back off the initial bittering addition a tad if I come back to brew this again. I think the aftertaste can be a little much. These two things would really improve the beer. I’m looking forward to getting my fermentation temperatures under control and procuring a wort chiller (leaning heavily towards a plate chiller at the moment…) to help with my off flavors and clarity. When tasted side-by-side with a 60min IPA (that this was supposed to be a clone of) the DFH tastes almost smokey and extraordinarily clean.
score: 28
