Brewed – Dead Ringer
As far as IPA recipes go, Northern Brewer’s Dead Ringer kit is as straightforward as they come. NB has been sold out of Centennial hops for some time now, so I was sent 5 ounces of “Centennial-Type” hops from Hop Union. There’s a brief writeup found on the NB blog explaining that these are 70% Cascade, 30% Columbus. Substitutions notwithstanding, this was a pretty relaxed brewday for me.
With groundwater temps in the low 70s, I was again forced to knock out around 85° and throw the sealed fermenter in the fridge to cool before pitching. Actually, it’s still in the fridge on it’s way to 64°; I’ll most likely pitch in the morning, so I’m calling this Two-Parted on account of my brewday and pitch being non-contiguous.
The grist for this batch is 11# two-row, 1# crystal 40L. I love the color of this wort:
Sometime in the future I’d like to do a split batch of this grain bill and brew half with all Centennial (actual Centennial) hops, and half with all Columbus. Right now, I’m intent on building up my pipeline a bit again and getting my kegorator filled with beer I want to drink for the next few months. Fall is always a busy time at our house, and I spend most of my weekends chasing pheasants with my dog.
Two-Parted
- Batch Size: 5.5 gallons
- Total Grist: 12 pounds
- O.G: 1.060
- F.G:
- Brewhouse Efficiency: 75%
- Boil Time: 60 minutes
Fermentables
- 11# US Two-row
- 1# Crystal 40L
Hops
- .75oz Hop Union Centennial-type @ 60m
- 1oz Hop Union Centennial-type @ 20 m
- 2oz Hop Union Centennial-type @ 5 m
Other
- Irish Moss – 1tsp @ 15 minutes remaining
Notes
2012/08/05 – Brewed late-afternoon. Knocked out 5.5 gallons at 85°. Fermenter went into the fridge about 8pm to chill to pitching temps. Was still at 77° at 11:30pm, so I left it to chill to 64° overnight.
2012/08/06 – Wort given 60 seconds of oxygen; Decanted and pitched a 1600mL starter.
Friday Photo – East Coast Beer Swap
The brown truck brought me a package of East Coast IPAs last night! A fellow HomeBrewTalk member and I got to talking about clone recipes for Surly’s Abrasive Ale and I ended up sending a bunch of Surly out to North Carolina in exchange for some beer we can’t find anywhere near here. All told, I got 8 bottles of Dogfish Head 90 minute, 5 bottles of Uinta Hop Notch (1 broke in transit), 2 bottles of Smuttynose Finestkind, a 22oz bottle of Epic Brewing Company’s Imperial IPA from their Exponential Series, and a big bottle of Weyerbacher Double Simcoe.
Of that list, I’ve only tried the DFH 90, and only two bottles of that ever, so it goes without saying that I’m beyond excited to dig into this stack of brews and try out some East Coast hop bombs.
