Hop Juice

[BlackDuck]

I think my primary is pretty much done, so I'm not getting a whole lot of aroma out of it now. But when it was really going, the aroma coming out of the airlock every time it gurgled was pretty darn awesome. My fermenter is sitting at 63 F right now...it hit 66 - 67 during high fermentation.

I really can't give you any tips. My brew day was great, I had no issues. So all I would say is brew it like you would brew any other beer and let the ingredients do the work.

Good luck tomorrow...can't wait to hear your thoughts.

[Beer-lord]

Should be a beaut of a day tomorrow. High of 70, dry with low humidity with a 100% chance of a Heady Topper.
Yeast starter is going gang busters....I'll prolly not cold crash and just add the whole thing since it's pure yeast and starter malt and not a washed version. I'm going with the Giga Yeast GY001 which I'm pretty sure is very similar to WLP001.

[BlackDuck]

Well....it's cold, rainy and a chance of freezing rain and snow later, with an absolite 0% chance of Heady Topper.

[Beer-lord]

What a chillax brew day! I started late...at noon. 66 beautiful degrees and clear skies and a light wind. The evil twin came by and we hit 1.078 even though I added a bit more water this time.
Smelled great, looked even better and the mix of Maris Otter and 2 row is a beer marriage.
I have a beast of a yeast starter of Giga yeast 001 so I expect a lot of activity and have already connected a blow off to the fermenter.

Plus, we got to drink Heady Topper. It was very good but I was expecting even more. I think the lack of aroma surprised me. This is a very flavorful beer. Not very bitter, just tasty good. Nothing to complain about at all. You don't know you're drinking an 8% beer but the west coast IPA in me was expecting a nose. It didn't disappoint and I can see why it's so very popular. I'm glad I got to try this one.

[BlackDuck]

Glad you had a successful brew session. Did you taste the gravity sample???

[Beer-lord]

Oh yeah, very, very bitter and sweet of course. Never used so much Apollo so we'll get a good idea what that is like. I made my OG even though I had a tad more than 6 gallons in the fermenter. Blow off tube is ready to go and I expect a very vigorous fermentation with this Giga Yeast starter. It's huge and fast.

We always make bread on brew day but today, it was very good. I rarely use MO but 1/2 MO made the bread very enjoyable.
Thanks for putting together this recipe. I'm glad you did this so that if it sucks, the finger is pointing at you. Seriously, this one will be one to talk about.

[Inkleg]

I hope to brew mine this coming weekend. Going to pitch it with some BRY-97 yeast slurry. Glad to hear that both y'alls beers are going well.

[Inkleg]

Yeah right, if it's bad it's Chris's fault.

But, it's going to be great, so that make's it's Chris's fault too. Oh how I'll have to suffer drinking a good beer.

[BlackDuck]

You rat bastards are the one that dared me to do it....and I can't let a dare go down without a fight. If it sucks...I will never hear the end of it. BUT....if it's awesome, you guys will never hear the end of it.

I love putting MO in my recipes. I've been using it a lot lately. I think it add just enough complexity to these recipes that really goes great with all the hops that go into them. It really helps in balancing it out.

And if it even tastes remotely good, I'm entering it into the Ohio State Fair Competition with my Four Point Pale and my German Pilsner. Then we'll really see how good it is.

[Beer-lord]

Go get em!

[BlackDuck]

And the timing should be perfect. Judging day is the 31st of May...so this will be in the bottle enough time to carbonate and a couple extra weeks to condition nicely. Should be a very fresh specimen. The only question will be what category to enter it as...IPA or IIPA. According to the stats it should be an IIPA. That's probably what it will go in as.

[Inkleg]

You rat bastards are the one that dared me to do it....and I can't let a dare go down without a fight. If it sucks...I will never hear the end of it. BUT....if it's awesome, you guys will never hear the end of it.

Yeah ok, what ever Scooter.

I love putting MO in my recipes. I've been using it a lot lately. I think it add just enough complexity to these recipes that really goes great with all the hops that go into them. It really helps in balancing it out.

I'm with you on this. I have a Simcoe IIPA with MO that is pretty tasty.

And if it even tastes remotely good, I'm entering it into the Ohio State Fair Competition with my Four Point Pale and my German Pilsner. Then we'll really see how good it is.

They are all going to kick ass.

[Beer-lord]

Definitely a double/imperial IPA.
I don't think I'm going to do a secondary on this even with all the hops so we'll see how that affects the aroma. The color is going to be nice too. I bet you get some good comments on it.

[Inkleg]

After the results from my Pliny, I wish I would have gone ahead and entered it in both categories.
Just something to think about.

[Kealia]

Sounds like you guys have a winner there. I'm betting all y'all will turn out great beers but the only way to tell will be to have an independent judge taste all three side by side.

Now who could that be.......?