Using a pale LME kit, want an IPA. Thoughts?

Welcome to the BA site and to the Homebrewing forum. You're about to get involved in a hobby that will give a great sense of accomplishment while emptying your wallet, but it will be worth it.

Do you have a link to the kit/recipe that you are getting, and do you consider the hops that are in the kit to be your favorites? What other hop would you like included in the beer if you want something else?

 

Dry-hopping is not ambitious at all for your first brew; you can do it right in your primary fermentor when fermentation is done or nearly done. Which do you use for your primary fermentor, a bucket or a carboy? In a bucket it's easy to put the hops in a hop bag for dry-hopping which makes it easy to remove them when dry-hopping is done. A carboy necessitates dry-hopping by dropping the loose pellets into the carboy, and then later you have do your best to avoid siphoning them into your bottling bucket.

Since you want to go off-recipe and convert this pale ale recipe to an IPA, you essentially want to bump up the malt a bit to get into the ABV range of a typical IPA (unless you want this to be a session IPA), and also add more hops. Do you have a local homebrew supply store close to you so that you can pick up 3-4 ounces of hops and a pound of dry malt extract?

 

Have you experienced a brew day before? If not, read www.howtobrew.com and stick with the recipe as presented. My first brew day seemed pretty crazy the day of, in hindsight it went really smooth. Getting the process down is the biggest lesson from that first brew, and changing the recipe can cause unnecessary confusion. That being said, you gotta brew something you like. I would leave the recipe alone, but add some dry hops to make it pop. Esentially, add an ounce of your favorite flavor hop directly into the beer a week after brew day and let it sit another week. It doesn't muck up the brew day, and you get a beer you like.

 

Another option is to keep the same recipe but add more of the ingredients.

Your recipe has 1oz cascade@60 and 1oz@20. Just make it 2oz@60 and 1oz@20. You may want to up your malt too so when you add your LME, add 1lb of Pilsen DME also.

http://www.midwestsupplies.com/downloads/dl/file/id/824/product/9600/beer_simply_beer_pale_ale.pdf

 

It comes with 1 packet of US-05. Per Mr Malty that is about enough (New OG would be 1.052). If your yeast is very old it may end up under-pitched. Since you are probably not going to do a starter you may want to get a second one

 

Why not 2oz at flameout and leave the bittering alone?

 

You could do that but you would also be concentrating the unfermentables in the extract possibly leaving your beer sweeter than you might like. I recommend just using some plain sugar to get the ABV up. The sugar would be 100% fermentable and not be to big an issue.

 

Also a good option but I was trying not to add any steps, only increased quantities

 

I would have upped the 20 min addition, doubling the bittering addition (for my tastes) is never an option.