East Valley IPA
After some friends and I tore through the better part of the Pliny clone I brewed, I’m short an IPA on tap. At the moment there’s still some of my Ruination 10th Anniversary clone left, but it turned out a bit sweet, and it’s a sipper for sure. I want something hoppy but drinkable, so I’m brewing a tweaked version of my Hop Knot Clone. I absolutely love the grain bill for Hop Knot, as well as the yeast character. The hop character is also fantastic, but I want to try to throw some CTZ in the recipe to see how it tastes with some of that dank/resinous quality that CTZ has.
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American Altbier
It’s been a good while since I’ve brewed anything malty. Everything I’ve made for the past five months has been pale other than the Black IPA I made. Even though it’s really hard to imagine the cooler temps of fall when it’s July in Arizona, I’m going to brew an Altbier in anticipation of the cooler fall nights. I really didn’t stick to a specific style for this one (Dusseldorf or Northern German), and I’m using decidedly American ingredients for this batch. Which makes this beer sort of an American Altbier.
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2012 Nuclear Penguin — R.I.P.
It’s finally here, time to brew my 2012 edition of Nuclear Penguin. This beer started off a little over a year ago when I brewed a clone of Dogfish 120 Minute. It turned out pretty awesome, and despite all the tedious work that batch required, it was really fun. So after the beer was done, tasting delicious, and aging gracefully in bottles, I starting thinking about brewing it again. But much like Sam and crew did on Brewmasters, I went back to the drawing board, and thought about what I wanted this beer to taste like. I didn’t necessarily want another 120 Minute clone, but rather a 15%+ ABV IPA that was more of a blend of Pliny the Younger and 120 Minute.
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Power Outage Blonde Ale
What. A. Brew. Day. Literally an hour after I was telling my fiance how much I’m enjoying brewing indoors on my new electric system, the power goes out. Fantastic. Thankfully it didn’t catch me at too inconvenient time during the brew day, but what a pain in the ass. I suppose I should talk about the beer before I get too far into my mishaps. I’m brewing a simplified version of the Honey Blonde I’ve brewed in the past. I’m switching to a single hop (Centennial), and only using a single specialty malt (C10). The one thing I always liked about that beer was the cracker-y/biscuit-y character that it had, so I changed 30% of the base malt to Marris Otter, to bring some of that character back. Other than those changes, it’s the same beer.
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IPA Clone Series: Stone Ruination 10th Anniversary IPA
This beer wasn’t originally on the schedule. Double Jack was supposed to be the next beer I brewed, but that changed after a trip to San Diego in mid-June. Stone had just released their 10th Anniversary Ruination, and I tracked down a few bottles while I was in town. This special release of Ruination has exactly twice the hops(5lbs/bbl) and more alcohol(10.8%) than the standard Ruination. After my first sip, I knew I needed to try to clone this beer. It’s definitely one of the best Imperial IPAs I’ve ever had.
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Bertus Pale Ale (aka East Valley Pale Ale)
With my last couple beers being high gravity/high alcohol IPAs, and the next few beers planned are high alcohol IPAs, I need to squeeze in a beer that’s a little more drinkable. It’s been almost a year since I last brewed my Pale Ale, so I figured I would knock out a batch before my Fiance and I run back to California again this weekend. It just so happened that August (Owner of our Crossfit gym) picked up a Kegerator for the gym a few days ago. So I made this a 12 gallon batch, rather than the 6 gallons planned, so that we have beer on tap at the gym in a few weeks.
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IPA Clone Series: Pliny the Younger
**Update** I brewed an updated clone here. It’s dead on. Use that one.
It’s been awhile since my last post, but I’ve got a good one for today. Ahh, Pliny the Younger… This beer is like the mystical unicorn to me. I would still love to try it some day, but I’ve yet to talk myself into making the trek to Santa Rosa in February. So, I decided to brew a clone. The only unfortunate part is, I won’t know how close the clone is, since I’ve never had the real thing. I’ve had the Elder so I do have something to go off of, but we’re still shooting in the dark here. Maybe I’ll build up the guts to send a bottle to Vinnie. Anyway, on to the recipe formulation.
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IPA Clone Series: Four Peaks Hop Knot
For the first brew in my IPA Clone Series, I’m brewing Four Peaks Hop Knot. I love this beer. Not only because it’s local and I love to support Four Peaks, but it really is a flipping fantastic IPA. It also just won Gold at the World Beer Cup for American Strong Pale Ales, so apparently I’m not the only person that loves it! This batch will be going to the East Valley Open Weightlifting Comp at East Valley Crossfit on June 23rd. Despite the tight deadline, everything turned out well.
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Hoppy Summer Wheat
We’re over 105* (middle of May as I’m writing this), so it’s officially Summer in Phoenix. Time to say goodbye to 90* temperatures, I’ll see you again sometime in late October. I’m definitely in mood for something nice and citrusy for the hot weather. I absolutely love Lagunitas – A Little Sumpin’ Sumpin’, but the 7.5% ABV sneaks up on you. So I want to make something along those lines, but with less booze.
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Experimental Hop Pale Ale
I was placing an order for hops with Farmhouse Brewing Supply when I noticed they had some experimental hops in stock — HBC 342. Impulse kicked in, and I bought around 12 ounces to play with. The spec sheet of the hops is here, but to summarize, they are a fairly high-alpha hop with a “pleasant aroma” described as “citrusy and watermelon”. That sounds good. So I took my standard Pale Ale recipe, and replaced all the hop additions with HBC 342, only changing the bittering charge to keep the IBUs the same.
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