Photo credit: donosborn.com

Over the past year I've really studied the differences between professional brewers and home brewers. While there are many, one of the big differences in hoppy beers is that pro brewers whirlpool their wort post boil (hot), and home brewers typically do not. Pro brewers often add copious amounts of hops during this time, while it's rare to see home brewers add hops after flameout, and delay chilling their wort. After thinking about this for awhile, I realized, why not?

If you've been brewing for any period of time, you've certainly re-brewed a batch you've brewed before. Unfortunately, repeatability is one of the more challenging things for a home brewer. We, as home brewers, don't brew the same beers day-in and day-out, and we often don't have rock solid, repeatable processes during the brew day. I know I've had this issue myself, and it's definitely something that bothers me. I've found that keeping better brewing logs can really help.

Brewing a 120 Minute IPA clone is much like having a newborn: It's very temperamental, and it needs fed twice a day. In all seriousness, this beer is a lot of work. You need to be very organized, and very sanitary, as you'll be messing with your fermenting wort daily. So here are a collection of tips and tricks I learned along the way that will help should you want to tackle this beer.

After this post discussing my plan to brew a cross between 120 Minute and Pliny the Younger, I got some feedback that I should post the recipe and process for the original 120 Minute clone. Most of the info is detailed here, but that thread is a million pages long and the information isn't condensed. Unfortunately, there's a flipping ton of information about this beer, so hold onto your hats, this is going to be a long one.

Kill the Flash
Please, for the love of good looking photos, turn off the flash. Flashes on most consumer cameras are nearly useless. Unless you absolutely can't see anything in the photo without the flash, you're better off without; it's that simple. Photos of people and things almost always look better without the flash, and beer definitely falls in that category. Flash light reflects off the glass, and washes out the photo. Improve the ambient lighting if you need to, or find another location to shoot before you turn the flash on.

Let's face it, every new recipe we brew is a gamble. As we become better brewers, we learn how to make more new beers successes rather than failures, but it's never a sure thing. Every brewery is different, every brewer's process is different, and at the end of the day, we're all counting on 200 billion organisms to ferment our beer the way we intend. So what am I getting at?

Since I started this blog, among other things, I write about the beers I brew. I typically post my recipe and brew day notes, and then I've tried to follow up with a post describing how the batch turned out. Well I've thought about it, and I don't believe that's the best approach.

First and foremost, I know that few people reading this blog care about what beers are going to be on-tap at my house soon (at least outside those that drink my beers). So there's no need to attempt to capture someone's interest with a good looking recipe only to make them wait 4-8 weeks to see results. That leads to the second point: People are result oriented; I know I am. I write to share. Whether it be a new trick I learned, best brewing practices, or great recipes, sharing is very much a part of the homebrew spirit. But unless I know a process works, or that a recipe turned out well, I'm typically not inclined to try it. If a recipe I brewed turned out like crap, I want the results right next to the recipe so someone won't make the same mistakes I did. Since I don't have a journalism background, I've been having to learn some of the tricks of the trade the hard way, and it seems that reporting half of a story isn't best practice.

So I'm going to take this blog in a slightly different direction, at least in terms of the posts related to my batches. I'm going to hold off posting the recipe and brew day notes until the beers are done. I'm not doing this to cover up my less than stellar batches, but rather to shrink the distance between concept and results. Unfortunately this does mean that there will be a lag time before my next post regarding my beers. Don't fret, I'll keep my blog updated with other content in the mean time, but after my Furry Penguin is done fermenting, it'll realistically be one to two months before you'll see another post regarding a recipe/brew day. After that, I'll be back on schedule.

That's the long and short of it. Stick around because I have some really cool beers planned for the next few months, and I look forward to sharing the creative things i stumble across along the way!

It always seems to happen. Every time I plan a number of beers in advance, I never manage to stick to the schedule. Thankfully I did make it through five of the six beers I had recently planned, but it looks like the Pale Ale is going to get pushed back. Sometimes my creative ADD takes over.

I've really been fascinated by some of the fringe IPAs (black, wheat, rye) lately, and I've been wanting to make one for awhile now. Stone's Sublimely Self-Righteous is one of my favorites, as well as Odell Mountain Standard and Hops in the Dark. That was until I tried Stone's 15th Anniversary Escondidan IPA. What an incredible beer that is; such a huge mouthfeel with a boat-load of Citra character. I've been wanting to make something similar ever since I tried it.

Then very recently I bought a sixer of Ruthless Rye from Sierra Nevada, which recharged my impulse to brew a Rye IPA. Fantastic beer, again with a lot of Citra aroma. Well it just so happens I have a lot of Citra hops, and I love Citra and Amarillo together, so why not make a Black Rye IPA featuring those hops? I want this beer to be a little bigger than an IPA, but not quite as huge as the Stone BIPAs. Maybe something around 8% give or take.

So I tossed together a quick recipe for what I think will be a great beer. The only thing holding me back on brewing this next is the fact my last four beers have all been 1.060 or higher, and I'm in dire need of a session-strength beer right now. Which leads to my next creative impulse.....

A couple of months ago, I purchased 12oz of experimental hops(HBC 342), and they've been practically screaming at me from the freezer, begging to be used. The plan is to take my pale ale(a 1.055 beer) recipe, and replace all the hops with HBC342.

So now it's a coin toss over which beer I'll brew in the next couple weeks; I'm still debating...Anyway, on to the recipe for the Black Rye IPA!

6 gallons
13lbs 2-row
2lbs 10oz Rye
14oz Crystal 60
14oz Carafa Special III
Mash @ 152*
1.5oz Warrior (17% AA) @ 60
2oz Amarillo/Citra @ 15
3oz Amarillo/Citra @ 0
Dry Hop - 4oz Amarillo/Citra
Safale US-05 - fermented at 62*F

Target OG: 1.075
Target FG: 1.015