Help with my NEIPA

Weedy, I used Fermentis S-04 (Whitbread strain) to brew my batch of a so called NE style IPA and the resulting beer was turbid/murky. I have used S-04 to brew several others styles of beers: Stouts, Brown Ales, 'regular' IPAs,... and all of those other styles dropped clear.

I am uncertain what your personal beliefs are but my theory is that when using the Whitbread yeast strain to produce a so called NE style IPA the turbid/murky appearance is not due to the yeast strain per se but is mostly due to the proteins and polyphenols present in this sort of beer: proteins from high protein grains (e.g., wheat malt) and the large amounts of polyphenols from generous late and dry hopping.

Cheers!

P.S. We may want to take this over to PM for further discussion (if warranted).

 

I can report that Jess really knows his stuff. He was helpful to me on a number of occasions when he was formerly working at Wyeast.

Cheers!

 

@JackHorzempa , perhaps an experiment is due (if not already done). Split batch NEIPA w/ half getting the Whitbread and the other half getting something like US-05.

 

I've made super turbid NE IPA with US-05, 04 and Conan... No crazy amounts of oats, wheat, etc... All in the hopping technique.

Those beers didn't drop clear, either.

 

I'll throw a wrench into the mix. I recently brewed a NEIPA with 1318 and it dropped brilliantly clear. First time I have seen or heard of it happening. That was in lees than 1 months time too.

 

That happened with my second NEIPA attempt with 1318. I called it my West Coast- NEIPA! Clear as a bell.

 

Last spring (2016) Jason (@SFACRKnight) brewed a split batch of a hoppy beer using 1318 and Wyeast 1056. He was kind enough to send me some bottles. I conducted a blind taste test of these beers (triangle test and subsequently a side-by-side taste test). Afterwards I poured the remaining beer from the two bottles in clear glass (see below). Guess which beer of the two was brewed using 1318.

Cheers!

 

There are so many different ways to make these beers as demonstrated by the true "leaders" of this style.... examples:

Hill Farmstead
- No wheat or oats (looks like it too)
- highly flocculent yeast strain
- iBUs are always up there (definitely above 50/60)
- high protein base malt
- softness is more process related than anything

Alchemist
- No wheat or oats to "increase haze"
- high protein base malt
- Beers will drop totally clear (with floaties)
- very high S04 low CL
- very high IBU

Treehouse
- supposedly no wheat or flaked adjuncts in core hoppy beers
- high SO4 moderate CL
- highly flocculent yeast strain/strains
- IBUs higher than you think

Trillium
- highly flocculent yeast
- high SO4 content
- wheat helps to increase haze
- very dry finish

The whole super high chloride low So4 line is total crap. High chloride levels have a distinct minerally feel/taste in my mind and based on the final water reports on certain beers I've seen I seriously doubt anyone is going too far north of 100. But their So4 levels are all rather high. On beers north of 7% I would guess over 300ppm.

Their are so many recommendations out there that maybe produce "soft" beers but they also produce really muddled crap without defined flavors and often times more process oriented off flavors.

Hill Farmstead and Treehouse kill everyone when it comes to mouthfeel. Both very full but HF is softer.

I honestly believe there are other things that no one is even discussing that some of these guys do, 90% of it process oriented.

 

Personally I think they all taste better with a little time on them as long as their cold. The whole "fresher the better " that leads people to think their beer needs to be crazy fast grain to glass is dunny. The OG beer for this style is roughly 28 days brew day to canning. And it supposedly uses the lowest dry hopping rates of all of them, less than 1oz per gallon. There is fresh and then there's green. Even the brewers say they like the beers with a little time on them. They round out and become much less sharp and agro resulting in a more enjoyable drinking experience. Willing to bet that the TH, HF, Alchemist beers are 21-28 days from brew day to packaging.

 

My last batch, weldwerks ddh juicy bits clone, is dropping clear as well.

 

Can you please provide more details on your source of water information. Do you have information on the various brewery's brewing water? You made mention of "final water reports", is this measuring the mineral content of the packaged beer? If so, wouldn't the minerals provided by the grains impact this?

Any further details you can provide here would be greatly appreciated?

Cheers!

@telejunkie

 

But doesn't 'the clock' start at the packaging date? Some folks advocate that hoppy beers are best consumed very quickly post the packaging date (e.g., a few days from bottling/canning). Other folks suggest that additional time in the package (e.g., two weeks) benefits the beer; sort of like additional conditioning time post packaging.

Cheers!

 

Yes it does. Sorry I reread that and it was a little confusing. I was referring to two things. All these posts I read about people trying to drink highly hopped homebrew as fast as they can. Like 7-10 days.

As well as the thought that the closer to canning date the better the beer is. I think that is valid to a point. Depending on the Brewery (Treehouse and Trillium to be specific, more so with Trillium) I would say the sweet spot is with a little time on them. Both Nate and JC have said the same thing I believe.

 

Yes water reports of finished beer. Yes malts add a ton of minerals but you can still gain quite a bit of info from the final beer report. The Heady ward labs report is out there. I've sent a few more beers from the fabled NE breweries in. People have published some of theirs with different salt profiles. I've sent a few of mine in with completely different water profiles, etc. Alchemist beers are mostly Pearl, there might be two other malts in there at very small percentages. Heck you know Skadoosh is all Pearl (unless he's lying). Not that hard to brew something with mostly Pearl and a hardness level close to 750 and see how close your results get to the final profile of Heady. Through the process of elimination you can move in the right direction in my mind.

 

But, when they say that they are referring to drinking these beers 7-10 days from packaging, right?

Do you think that it is a requirement to drink hoppy beers one week from packaging?

Cheers!

 

I am confused here. How can you 'reverse engineer' what the brewing water profile is from a finished beer? How do you know the level of minerals that were provided by the brewing water vs. the grain bill?

Cheers!

@utahbeerdude @telejunkie

 

Brew a beer with a large portion of Pearl Malt and minimal Gypsum. Brew the same beer with an incredibly large amount of gypsum. Compare the ward labs report for Heady and the ward labs report you get back on your beer. There are correlations.

 

ETA: I don't actually use Wyeast. I use the equivalent strain from Imperial Organic. I highly recommend that anyone that hasn't given them a shot does so on their next batch. Not only is their yeast great, the people working there and ownership are all really great people to work with.[/QUOTE]
I just picked up the A24 Dry Hop because the LHBS was out of 1318. Any advice on this strain? I try for a soft mouthfeel IPA with big citrus aromas and a balance of fruit and pine/dank flavors and bitterness. I have my recipe and process locked down. Just not sure how to adjust the fermentation for this strain.

Should I ferment this yeast in the high 60s or low 70s to start? How are the esters?

 

While I'm not 100% disagreeing with you that the high chloride levels are crap...there certainly are enough brewers out there making high chloride beers and not getting an "overly minerally" taste. In fact I actually do get a minerally taste in Treehouse beers and hence why in my clone recipe for BYO called for 100:200 SO4:Cl. I personally go between 100:100 up to 200:100 on my of my NEIPA brews.
That said...Scott Janish did a great write up on the topic: http://scottjanish.com/chasing-mouthfeel-softness/
"I have a good friend and great brewer who has gone as high as 250 ppm of chloride without success describing the beer as medicinal and astringent. It might also depend on how much gypsum you’re adding to the beer as well."

 

I just picked up the A24 Dry Hop because the LHBS was out of 1318. Any advice on this strain? I try for a soft mouthfeel IPA with big citrus aromas and a balance of fruit and pine/dank flavors and bitterness. I have my recipe and process locked down. Just not sure how to adjust the fermentation for this strain.

Should I ferment this yeast in the high 60s or low 70s to start? How are the esters?[/QUOTE]

Oops, didn't see this until now. I have only used A24 a couple times in experiments. I fermented in the low 70's. I'm not sure that I would call the strain truly appropriate for an NEIPA, but it will make a fantastic hoppy beer. In an unhopped wort, it had a nice pineapple flavor. I've used it a few times in dry hopped sours with great success. I had actually forgotten about that and now I want to do one of those again!