Galaxy IPA or DIPA Recipe help

Here's the recipe for my 100% Galaxy, 100% Brettanomyces Belgian IPA - which turned out fantastic. Note that recipe is for 2.5 gallon batch:

5 lbs Belgian Pale malt
0.5 lbs Briess Caramel 20

Sacch’ Rest: 150° F for 60 minutes
Mashout: 170° F for 10 minutes

1 oz Galaxy (60 mins)
0.5 oz Galaxy (20 mins)
0.5 oz Galaxy (5 mins)
1 oz Galaxy (dry hop last 7 days of bulk conditioning)

yeast: Brettanomyces Bruxellensis Trois (from starter) @ 72F
added brettanomyces Bruxellensis dregs (Orval) a week in to help the yeast finish.

OG: 1.056, FG: 1.008, 6.3% ABV.

I wanted a "tropical fruit bomb", and combining galaxy with brett trois did just that. The beer sat in primary for 6 weeks, and has been in bottles for only 10 days. Had the first one last night, and it is delicious.

Not a traditional IPA recipe by any means, but if you're looking for loads of tropical fruits, then I highly recommend the galaxy / brett trois combo.

 

Galaxy:Nelson:Rakau 4:2:1 Very tropical fruity with a spicy edge

 

Some more info would help beyond a few other hops. What type of ipa are you shooting for or that you like? Any ingredients you want to use or are you looking to still buy everything at a LHBS.

 

I'm liking Columbus as a base for tropical hops to sit on. It provides a dank pungent foundation for the tropical fruit to play off of without getting muddled. I havent been as happy mixing hops that are all tropical (like galaxy+nelson+mosaic) not that its bad but it gets more generic tropical. So I might try bittering and middle additions with Columbus then add 2-4oz of galaxy late and dry hop. I like motueka with galaxy but otherwise haven't played around with it that much. Some chinook and simcoe late would probably be nice too. Galaxy can throw onion and kerosene so you might want to be concerned about that and perhaps back off a tad.

As far as malt base I don't like crystal malt with galaxy. So I'd go with something more dry/toasty like a British pale and victory.

 

Belma is good for bittering for just about anything, but I'd avoid using it with fruity or tropical hops later in the boil. It's more earthy than anything, and IMO is a bit "muddled" if you add much of it late. It's better for bittering, IMO.

That being said, I've only had galaxy in a couple commercial beers, so can't comment too much on that. But if I had columbus just sitting there next to the belma, I'd pick the columbus to bitter a galaxy IPA. I base this mostly on gut instinct (which is probably better for beers than it is for most other things in life).

 

I've done a successful all galaxy IPA recipe using exactly 8oz of galaxy with the following hop schedule that surprisingly came out better than my "normal hop schedule" I use these days.

5 gallons:

1.25oz @ 60, 30, 20, Flame Out
3oz @ Dry Hop for 9 days at room temperature

Base beer was 89% 2 row, 5.5% carapils, 2.75% C40, and 2.75% C10

 

Koopa - did your choice of galaxy hops have anything to do with changing your typical IPA hop schedule? And if so, why do you think the early-ish (20, 30 min) additions helped out?

 

It didn't. This galaxy IPA was brewed quite along time ago before I adopted my current approach. Nowadays I'm usually going for more of a hop burst approach with a bigger nose. It rarely involves a 30 or even a 20 minute addition. With the older hop schedule I used in previous batches, I wouldn't get anywhere near as much of a nose, but I do remember this one particular batch of galaxy IPA having intense FLAVOR. Could have been due to a few things though.... First and most importantly, I believe it was the best quality galaxy hop crop I've ever purchased. I don't think the annual crops I've purchased since then have been as good of quality. Second, and least intuitively, I think that sometimes an enormous aroma can in some ways mask flavor. Not very intuitive since aroma dominates our sense of taste so much, I know. But often I also find that if I have a keg of hop bursted IPA that I don't finish quickly, I feel that I can taste a bigger flavor as the aroma tapers off. The phenomenon is most apparent when you flavor with different hops than you dry hop with. Not sure if there is anything to my observations, so take them for what they are worth and thanks for asking!

 

All very sensible, thank you for explaining.

 

The main thing with galaxy is it is high in cohumulone, which is supposed to give a harsher bitterness. Because of that, I used another hop (Apollo in my case, although warrior or columbus would work great too).

My schedule was this:
Apollo: .5 oz @60
Galaxy: 1oz @20
Galaxy: 2oz @10
Galaxy: 2oz @Flame Out

Then I dry hopped it twice, once in primary, and once in the keg (1.5oz each).

 

Give this a read....

http://www.barthhaasgroup.com/johbarth/images/pdfs/2009_BWI_Cohumulon.pdf

 

Whoever wrote that goes through the whole article trying to say that Cohumulone doesn't impact bitterness, then goes to say people would bitter stronger with more cohumulone, due to its higher yields. Well, if it has higher yields, then it produces more bitterness. More bitter would yield a harsher bitterness. So, higher cohumulone hops would produce a different, higher level of bitterness than lower hops.

It's very simple. If I have two hops that have 11% AA, and one has 40% cohumulone and the other 20%, and cohumulone produces a higher yield of bitterness, then the higher cohumulone hop is going to be more bitter, which would easily be considered more harsh.

This article reinforces what I stated, not disproves it.

 

My understanding of the article is different and I don't agree with your statement that more bitterness would equal harsher bitterness.

The first section of the article challenges Rigby's original study, which suggested that cohumulone had a negative impact on the quality of bitterness. See this intro summary....

"The poor reputation of cohumulone can be traced back to this one study and it is evident that the negative qualities attributed to cohumulone are simply based on conjecture. Neither Rigby's results, nor any research has shown that cohumulone is responsible for a decline in the quality of bitterness. Although this information is available, it has had little effect on influencing the widespread opinion, albeit incorrect, that cohumulone contains less desirable bittering substances. Unfortunately, this work continues to be cited in the same manner as it has in the past."

Then the article starts to focus on modern studies (Wacker Bauer) surrounding the quality of bitterness derived from cohumulone...

"As a result of this analysis, it was determined that beer brewed with cohumulone was not inferior to the other beer in any way. In addtion to studies conducted by Hughes, the more recent work by Shellhammer, which utilized state of the art technology, has corroborated findings that there are no differences in quality in bitterness due to isocohumulone and isohumulone. However, to date, these results appear to have been largely ignored."

 

This is my next to be brewed:

http://www.bertusbrewery.com/2013/10/wedding-batch-3-enjoy-by-092813.html

 

And it also says this: "What a particularly ironic twist of fate given the current high prices for hops, since brewers could potentially extract more bitterness from their hops due to the higher yields of cohumulone...."

The very notion of more bitterness is brought up in one of his statements, where when bittering with a higher cohumulone hops by percentage, that there was a higher alpha acid concentration. Being that every IBU calculator I've used has had only alpha acid percentage taken into effect (rager, tinseth), a spike due to high cohumulone content would be much more bitter, which would be judged as harsh.

He's basically said the bitterness isn't worse, as long as you use less hops. Of course!!! When I use less hops, my bitterness is less pronounced.

 

It's my understanding that the article is speaking of the quality of bitterness from high cohumulone hops, not the quantity of bitterness. So, the common take on high cohumulone hops is that when used to obtain a bitterness equal to that of a low cohumulone hop, the high cohumulone hops bitterness will be perceived as harsh, versus that of the low co hop which many consider to be comparatively less harsh.

 

I am interpreting the article as suggesting that:

The Rigby study set out to claim that a beer brewed with cohumulone produced both more overall bitterness (quantity) and a harsher bitterness (quality) than one brewed with humulone, despite the beers having the same iso alpha acid content. However, the beers used in the study actually wound up having different levels of iso alpha acid content in spite of that goal. This difference in iso alpha content is cited as being due to cohumulone's polarity and better solubility compared to humulone. The author then claims that, due to the difference in overall bitterness (quantity) and perhaps the research methods used in those previous studies, claims about the quality of the bitterness of said two beers is conjecture at best. The author then goes on to cite more modern studies, including one using "state of the art equipment" where no difference in the quality of bitterness was found when sensory panels compared samples of two beers made with cohumulone vs. humulone.

Now what I don't like is that the author doesn't directly claim that these modern studies were able to account for cohumulone's polarity and better solubility, ensuring that the two modern samples had the exact same amount of iso alpha acids. If they weren't able to, then it would seem that these modern findings have the same Achilles heal as the older studies.

As for the "What a particular ironic twist of fate" part, all he is saying is that it's a shame that hops high in cohumulone carry this false stigma of having a worse quality of bitterness since they actually have more quantity of bitterness and could help brewers save money on bittering hops if used.

 

Which is very true.

However, this would easily be interpreted as harsher bitterness, due to calculators only taking alpha acids into account, and not quantity of cohumulone or other components. Therefore, if you are aiming for a specific level of bitterness, say 50 IBU, a hop with a high level of cohumulone is likely to overshoot that IBU target, giving the impression of a harsher bitterness... which basically proves my point.

 

Your claim is merely that "more bitterness is always perceived as a harsher bitterness" which I simply don't agree with. It sounds like we will have to agree to disagree. I appreciate having had this exchange with you though. Be well, brew well, and have a Happy New Year!