Spring Pale Ale

 Given how busy the last year has been, it's a wonder I brewed at all. It had been since last summer that I brewed anything with an appreciable amount of hop character. Beckoning from the back of the brew freezer was the end of a mixed pound of American pellets that had been hanging out for better than a year, along with a bunch of whole cones I picked in our neighbourhood last summer. An American pale ale was in order.

The brewday went without incident, but the final product didn't end up very engaging or interesting. My bet is that the flaws in this beer come from oxidation, particularly in the secondary during dry hopping. Not having a lot of experience with whole hops, I made no attempt to break up the chunks of cones that came out of my vacuum-sealed bags. As a consequence, when I opened the bucket to bottle, I discovered floating hop glaciers that were still dry inside. For those that did soak up beer and break apart, I expect that they released a bit of trapped air in doing so. Live and learn.

This is further encouragement for me to work on simple recipes, perhaps even to begin a long-considered SMaSH series. This will help me learn what each ingredient I use contributes as well as hone my brewing and fermentation processes on a particular style. Not yet sure this will be my Year of Pale Ale, but anything's possible. Fortunately the IPA that followed this beer (posting soon) turned out more solid. Here's to warm-weather hoppy drinking.

Why Not Another APA?

Batch size: 5.5 gallons
Projected OG: 1.050
Projected SRM: 4.7
Projected IBU: 42.6
Boil time: 60 minutes
Brewhouse efficiency: 80%

Grains
84.2% - 8 lb Malteurop 2-row
15.8% - 1.5 lb Weyermann Organic Munich

Hops
.2 oz Warrior (16.7%) (60 min)
1 oz Galena (13.2%) (KO - caluculated as 5 min)
1 oz Willamette (4.7%) (KO - calculated as 5 min)
1.8 oz Warrior (KO - calculated as 5 min)
6.7 oz Neighbourhood-picked hops (Nugget?) (Dry hop 7 days)

Yeast
WY1450 Denny’s Favorite 50

Extras
1 tsp Irish moss (10 min)

Water additions (mash)
9 qts Distilled water (w/ 3 qts filtered tap water)
2 g Gypsum

Brewday: 16 March 2014
Mash: 152F for 60 minutes - dropped to 148F
Pre-boil volume: 6.75 gallons
Pre-boil SG: 10.2P (1.041)           

Following KO, chill to 180F, then whirlpool/hop stand for 30 minutes.  Finish chilling.
Ferment in swamp cooler at 65F.

Dry hop: 12 April 2014
FG: 1.012
ABV: 5.0%

Bottled: 23 April 2014
Bottled with 4.1 oz brown sugar.

Tasting Notes: Comes across weirdly fruity, but not in a hops-derived way; either yeast character, fermentation flaw, or oxidation. Darker than expected as well--though clarity is good--so I imagine it's one of the latter two reasons. Hop character lacking, though with this mix of hops I'm not sure what to expect. Not a complete failure, but far from the best it could be.