I brewed my first NEIPA (Northeast IPA) on Sunday, October 1, 2017. While doing a little research on the style, I discovered “Avg. Perfect Northeast IPA”, Kevin Quinn’s recipe at Brewersfriend.com which laid out clearly how to proceed. There are many positive reviews for this recipe. That made me feel confident that this would be a good start to my NEIPA adventure. The hop bill is huge and almost turned me off, but I was compelled by curiosity and put in a hop order.
I tried to stick as closely to the recipe as possible. I didn’t hit the numbers given for the water profile. I ended up with calcium 96, sulfate 89, chloride 131 using gypsum and calcium chloride additions. These additions to the mash water and sparge water are similar to what the recipe said, but Bru’n Water showed lower sulfate and chloride levels in the finished water profile.
About 15 minutes after mash in, I checked the pH. It was lower than expected at pH=5.17. Bru’n Water predicted 5.45, so this was puzzling. I added 1 gram of baking soda to the mash and check it again a few minutes later – pH=5.29. Close enough.
After mashing for about an hour and a half (intended one hour, but I have kids), I vorlaufed and sparged to 7.8 gallons of wort in the kettle for a 90-minute boil. I chilled the wort down quickly with my dual plate chiller rig stopping at 150°F for a 20-minute hop stand. I meant to stop chilling at 170F so I reheated the wort to 174°F during the hop stand. Afterwards, I resumed chilling the wort to around 45°F, covered the kettle, and let is sit for a few hours to settle out and let the temperature rise to pitching temp. After waiting and waiting, and as I was tired and it was getting very late, I decided to pitch the yeast starter at 57°F instead of my preferred 65°F. I added oxygen for 2 minutes, pitched the yeast, and put the lid and airlock on and placed in the fermenter refrigerator set at 65°F.
After 37 hours in the fermenter, there was very active krausening. I added the 7-day dry hops. The smell was great – citrusy, tangerine, orange, grapefruit. Lovely! I enjoyed opening the refrigerator each day to check on the beer. The smell just kept on giving. On day 8 I added the 3-day hops. This thing was loaded with hops!
On day 12, I kegged the beer and pulled a sample to check the gravity. SG=1.016. A bit higher that I expected perhaps. The OG was 1.065, so this gives my an approximate %ABV=6.5. I put the kegged NEIPA back into the refrigerator at 65°F in hopes that any further yeast activity might use up any oxygen that got in from the transfer and perhaps a further drop in gravity. It might be that the gravity reading is higher due to suspended particles, something that I am not accustomed to seeing at this point in the process. I’ll leave it there for a day or two then crash to serving temperature.
The empty fermenting bucket had tons of hops and yeast. The smell is perfect. I wish I had another batch of wort to throw in there to see how it would turn out. Perhaps next time.
The taste: Cloudy, a blast of citrusy hop heaven and juicy as promised. Cheers!
A taste of 12-day old NEIPA just after kegging.
After 17 days the beer is nicely carbed and has a thick foaming head.
