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Double IPA Recipe!
Double IPA Recipe!
Brew a
Double
IPA!
M y first Double IPA was called Inaugural Ale; it was
the first beer I ever brewed at Blind Pig Brewery in
Temecula, Calif. on June 23, 1994. We purchased some used
Building a Double IPA
To me, this is pretty simple: a Double IPA should not have a large
amount of crystal malt. After all, you are brewing a Double IPA,
equipment from the Electric Dave Brewery in Bisbee, Ariz. The not a barleywine. In my opinion, too much crystal malt mixed
7-barrel brewhouse was sound, but what was unique was the with American hops is a train wreck of hop aroma and flavor. Now
fact that the fermenters were plastic. This didnt bother me Im not saying that you shouldnt use some crystal malt; a little bit
much as I came into brewing professionally via homebrewing, will give you some color and body. A Double IPA needs to sit on
where fermenting in plastic was fairly common. What made a good malt foundation, but it doesnt need to be hampered with
me more nervous was the fact that I had never brewed a batch too much crystal malt that will get in the way of a good, clean hop
of beer commercially on my own, and, more importantly, I had character.
never brewed a batch of beer this large.
Obviously hops will be your primary concern when building a
With all this in mind, I took the recipe for what was to be our Double IPA recipe. But before we talk hops, lets talk malt and
Blind Pig IPA, doubled the hops (literally) and raised the malt yeast. In my opinion, the malt bill for a Double IPA should be
bill by 30 percent or so. I figured that if there were any off simple. It doesnt need to be anything more than two-row malt,
flavors in the Inaugural Ale, at least there would be enough Carapils (dextrin) malt, crystal malt, and possibly some acidulated
hops to help mask them. Thankfully, Inaugural Ale turned out malt. Beyond that, I highly suggest you use some dextrose (corn
great and we made it a tradition on our anniversary to brew a sugar) in the boil to help bump up the gravity. Not only will the
Double IPA. use of sugar help bring up the gravity of the wort, but because there
are simple sugars that the yeast can ferment straight through, you
Eventually both Rogue Ales and Stone Brewing brewed a will end up with a lighter bodied beer. This is of course purely up
Double IPA in the 90s, but it wasnt until 2001 when Vic and to you; I personally like to drink a Double IPA that is light in body
Cynthia Kralj from The Bistro in beautiful downtown Hayward, thus allowing the hops to plow through the overall flavor profile of
Calif. started one of the hoppiest beer festivals around, The the beer. If you like more body in your Double IPA, I would sug-
Bistro Double IPA Festival. That first fest had only 12 entries, gest you replace all or some of the sugar with more two-row malt
including my first batch of Pliny the Elder. to achieve an abv around 8 to 9 percent.
By Vinnie Cilurzo
Yeast may not be the first thing you think
about when crafting a Double IPA, but
dont let this decision fall by the wayside.
After all, the yeast is what brings together
all the flavors from all the ingredients
(including the yeast) in your beer. I per-
sonally like California Ale Yeast/Chico Ale
Yeast to brew any and all IPAs. Stay away
from any yeast that will leave any diacetyl
in the final beer.
Ingredients
for 6.0 gallons (22.7 L) [Net: 5 gallons (18.9 L) after hop loss]
a second dry hop addition through the One final technique I want touch on is
top of the fermenter. Once the second through the base of the cone. As a home- the concept of purging the secondary
dry hops are added we push the initial brewer, you can swirl your carboy or vessel, transfer tubing, kegs and bottles
dry hops (which are now in the cone of bucket. With two days to go on the dry with CO2. This is something that can be
the tank) back into suspension in the hops, the beer is dropped to 32 F. applied to all beers you brew at home
fermenter. We do this with a CO2 push and is a regular technique used in com-
BREWING
So now that we have talked about using
traditional IPA ingredients in an even "Pick 16" on-line hop
bigger version of a Double IPA, where
specialgreat prices
SUPPLY
can you go from here? To begin with,
you could explore the idea of making a
super hoppy beer with a lower abv, such
for "hoppy" brewing
as what I considered when I was formu-
lating the Pliny the Younger recipe. Oak
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chips could also be used in a Double IPA. Pittsburgh, PA 15205
In fact, when I was making the original (412) 937-0773 BEER & WINE SUPPLIES
Blind Pig IPA and Double IPA at Blind www.southhillsbrewing.com
Pig Brewing, each and every batch had
an oak chip addition along with the dry
hops. We chose to go with American oak
chips as they had a harder edge and were
not as soft in flavor when compared to
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Another idea Ive thought of exploring Yeast Bank & (412) 366-0151
is the use of non-traditional IPA hops. The Country Wines www.countrywines.com
Maybe instead of the usual suspects such Acid Test Kit
as Cascade, Centennial, Chinook, CTZ, WHOLESALE INQUIRIES WELCOME
Amarillo or Simcoe, try something differ-
ent such as Sterling. Or dare I say, East
Kent Golding or Styrian Golding for an
English Double IPA.