Recipe Critique for Imperial IPA

Almost looks like a single IPA. Sounds tasty though. Maybe try kicking up your hop additions, 2 oz. @ 60 and 2 oz. @ 20

EDIT - Posted before you edited thread title.

I've brewed two pretty damn good IPAs, all-grain, using only base malt and crystal. 15lb total, 1lb being Crystal.

 

Looks pretty good to me as well. I've never used that hop but it should be fine. Personally I would only dry hop with one oz. but like I said that's just my personal opinion. I've been brewing 2.5 gallon batches for the last 6 months (downgraded from 5 gallons) and have been dry hopping with 1 oz for 4-5 days and it has seemed too much for the first 3 weeks or more in the bottle. Not bad, just too much.

 

doesn't biscuit need to be mashed?

 

Yes

Recipe looks to be a pretty good single ipa

 

Just FYI, Zeus and Columbus (and Tomahawk) aren't just similar, they're actually the exact same hop. This has been proven with DNA testing. They are often collectively referred to as "CTZ" for this reason.

 

1) re: grain bill in general, you probably want to do a partial mash / mini mash (lots of instructions on google; it's easy), so you'll need some pale malt for that (can't just mash the specialty grains).

2) re: specialty malts, 10% crystal is a lot for my tastes (at least in a single hop columbus IPA). i've made an IPA with 10% crystal 20 and i thought it was a little much. the hops in that beer were
1.5oz chinook for bittering,
3oz total of 1/2 simcoe 1/2 cascade for flavor and aroma,
1.5oz total of the same 2 hops dry hop.
5% would be about the highest i'd want to go if emphasizing a pungent hop, probably even lower (sweet and pungent not my favorite thing).
love carapils in IPAs though.
biscuit, i could have sworn my friend went on a huge biscuit kick and threw it in a couple pale ales, but going through his recipes i'm not finding any. regardless, i think it will do the beer good, though maybe it too is a bit high %wise.

3) re: hop schedule, looks great to me. agree that going down to 1oz in dry hop could be a good idea, though i can never get enough stench in IPAs personally ._.

 

I agree with Pahn. Get a pound of pale malt or pils from a homebrew store and do a mini mash to make sure you aren't just adding a bunch more unfermentable dextrins aside from the bit you are already adding with cara-pils. If you can't get some base malt, then I'd adjust the grain bill accordingly to:

9.9 lbs of Pilsner Liquid Extract
10 oz. Crystal Malt 40
.5 lbs Cara-Pils

As you can see, I also think 1.5 lbs. of Crystal 40 is too much. I'm of the mindset that "less is more" especially when you are trying to showcase one particular hop variety.

 

I'll second what some others have said: It looks like a lot of crystal malt...way too much in my opinion. And the biscuit malt needs to be mashed.

As for the hopping, I personally would add more late addition hops (like another 2oz at KO).

 

I would drop all the specialty malts and add a pound of dextrose at flame out. You will have enough unfermentables in the extract that will give you body. My IPA's need to be dry, so when I brew one I go 85% 2 Row, 15% Munich and 1 lb dextrose. That's just me though. The best way I have learned in homebrewing is to do what you want to do and then alter things based on the outcome and your individual tastes.

 

I don't think so.

 

The Biscuit needs to be mashed. Cara-Pils and the Crystal are both fine to be steeped.

Can either change this to a partial mash, or drop the Biscuit.

 

http://www.foamrangers.com/malts.phtml
This is where i obtained the info...

"
Carapils
(Dextrin Malt)
" Dextrins lend body, mouth feel and palate fullness to beers, as well as foam stability. Carapils must be mashed with pale malt, due to its lack of enzymes. Use 5 to 20% for these properties without adding color.
If this is wrong then I'll have to find a new quick reference

 

You need a new quick reference.

They are correct that there are no enzymes, but the malting process that creates the Cara malts (and roasted malts) converts the starches to sugars, and you are merely adding water to put the sugars into solution.

The enzymes are required for malts that have starches that still require conversion.

 

Thanks for clearing this up for me

edit - I deleted my previous post

 

All Comubus IPA works well. I would add more bittering hops if your attenuation runs relatively low like this - another oz of Columbus. And don't worry too much about the "calculated" IBUs.

 

I like my IPA's dry as well. You could just add some plain table sugar to dry it up a bit. I dont think all that extract is going to ferment down to 1.018 anyway. Add some sugar to drop the FG down (maybe 1lb). I usually add atleast 2lbs sugar to my all grain DIPA's and it works very nice.