Session IPAs - Sturm und Drang

So what does “session IPA” mean, anyway?  It's a term I hadn't heard until recently.  I first encountered the concept in reading about Brewing TV’s Little Bear Session CDA recipe and BrewDog’s Nanny State “imperial mild”.  While Nanny State sounds like ridiculous fun, Little Bear is more what captures the essence for me: a moderate-gravity beer with the enhanced malt and hop profile of an IPA.  Reaching the end of my sack of base malt and bulk-buy hops, I decided ten gallons of extra hoppy beer in the 5.5-6% ABV range sounded like a much better idea than 5 gallons of a super boozy tastebud-stripper for the hot months.

Though both beers were designed to land within the same basic guidelines, their profiles are quite different.  Sturm is in a traditional vein: golden amber in colour with a blend of “C” hops (Cascade, Centennial, and Columbus) added following a pretty conventional hopping schedule, and fermented with a neutral American yeast.  Drang takes the darker path of a black IPA, was fermented with English yeast, focuses on Amarillo hops (supplemented with Cascade and Columbus) and employs more novel hopping methods like first wort hopping, heavy late-boil additions and adding dry hops in waves over several days.

Brewday went fine, though with two beers to brew, it was on the long side.  Joe came by to help with the late hopping on Drang.  This was also my first time using Fermcap-S, and I have to say that I was very impressed at how well just a couple drops really gentled out the overfoaming, particularly for the hot break.

At bottling the other night, the bitterness was much more pronounced than I'd intended, with Drang exhibiting some possible astringency as well.  They also fermented out lower than I'd planned; I've been hesitant to mash much above 150F since I had a few extract beers finish too sweet, but a bit more residual sugar in this style would probably be welcome to balance the hops.  Next time around I may lower both the OG and IBUs; maybe I can get three beers instead of two out of nearly a pound of hops!  That's not to talk down this round, though; Sturm had a particularly wonderful orange aroma that wafted out of the bottling bucket.  I'm looking forward to taking some of these down to my orchestra festival the latter half of this month; they should go well with our late-night games of Texas Hold 'Em.

Sturm - Summer ‘11 Session IPA

Batch size: 5.25 gallons
Projected OG: 1.052
Projected SRM: 6.5
Projected IBU: 41.3
Boil time: 60 minutes
Brewhouse efficiency: 80%

Grains/Fermentables
54.3% - 4.75 lb 2-row
34.3% - 3 lb Munich
11.4% - 1 lb Light brown sugar (10 min)

Hops
C-Hop Blend (8.6%): 3.2 oz Centennial, 2 oz Cascade, 1oz Columbus
.5 oz (60 min)
1 oz (20 min)
1.5 oz (5 min)
3.2 oz (Dry hop 8 days)

Yeast
1 pkg US-05

Extras
1 tsp Irish moss (10 min)
1 tsp Yeast nutrient (10 min)

Water Additions (mash)
2 qts Distilled water
1 g Gypsum

Brewday: 19 June 2011
Mash-in: 153F for 60 minutes
Pre-boil volume: 6.9 gallons
Pre-boil SG (w/o sugar): 9P (1.036)

Fermented in swamp cooler, ambient temp 60F

Dry hop: 2 July 2011

Bottled: 11 July 2011
FG: 1.007
ABV: 5.9%
Bottled 5 gallons with 4 oz table sugar
Incredible orange aroma in the bottling bucket

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Drang - Summer ‘11 Session BIPA

Batch size: 5.25 gallons
Projected OG: 1.056
Projected SRM: 27.2
Projected IBU: 44.7
Boil time: 60 minutes
Brewhouse efficiency: 84%

Grains/Fermentables
51.7% - 4.75 lb 2-row
21.8% - 2 lb Munich
10.9% - 1 lb C 80
4.7% - 7 oz Carafa III (fine ground, added before sparge)
10.9% - 1 lb Light brown sugar (10 min)

Hops
.5 oz Amarillo (7.8%) (FWH)
.5 oz Columbus (14.5%) (FWH)
1 oz Cascade (5%) (15 min)
.5 oz Amarillo (10 min)
1 oz Amarillo (5 min)
1 oz Amarillo (Dry hop #1 - 8 days)
1.1 oz Cascade  (Dry hop #2 - 6 days)
1.6 oz Amarillo (Dry hop #3 - 4 days)
.5 oz Columbus (Dry hop #4 - 2 days)

Yeast
1 pkg Nottingham

Extras
1 tsp Irish moss (10 min)
1 tsp Yeast nutrient (10 min)

Water Additions (mash)
2 qts Distilled water
1 g Gypsum

Brewday: 19 June 2011
Mash-in: 153F for 60 minutes
Pre-boil volume: 6.5 gallons
Pre-boil SG (w/o sugar): 10P (1.040)

Fermented in swamp cooler, ambient temp 60F

Dry hop #1: 2 July 2011

Bottled: 11 July 2011
One day later than intended; extended dry hopping!
FG: 1.008
ABV: 6.3%
Bottled 5 gallons with 4 oz table sugar
Sample was a bit astringent; curious to try it cold & carbed