Citra Pale Ale

I purchased a keg setup from Midwest brew supply and a fridge from Best Buy that I intend to make into a kegerator (pictures/guide to come when I do it all). I've been thinking about what beers to keg, for my first kegged beer I picked a Citra Pale Ale.

The inspiration for this beer came from Kyle. When we were drinking the Citra IPA which was our first legitimate all grain brew(the prior brew was done just as a walk through, it turned out a bit too bitter) Kyle's first thought was that he wanted it to be a bit less bitter, and then he decided he wanted a bit less body. I wanted a bit more carbonation, and a bit more aroma. Thus I decided to reduce it from an IPA to a Pale. I did this to keep the sugars down because I wanted to reduce this to a session beer that I'd want to drink more often. This yielded a recipe with 2 fewer ounces of total hops, and 4 pounds less grain.

(read more after the break)

Citra Pale Ale (5 gallon recipe)

8 lbs Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM) 88.9 %

8 oz Cara-Pils/Dextrine (2.0 SRM) 5.6 %

8 oz Caramel/Crystal Malt - 40L (40.0 SRM) 5.6 %

0.50 oz Citra [12.00 %] - Boil 20.0 min 12.8 IBUs

1.00 oz Citra [12.00 %] - Boil 12.0 min 17.7 IBUs

1.25 oz Citra [12.00 %] - Boil 7.0 min 14.2 IBUs

1.25 oz Citra [12.00 %] - Boil 0.0 min 0.0 IBUs

1.0 pkg American Ale (Wyeast Labs #1056)

1.00 oz Citra [12.00 %] - Dry Hop 0.0 Days 0.0 IBUs

Est Original Gravity: 1.047 SG

Est Final Gravity: 1.010 SG

Estimated Alcohol by Vol: 4.7 %

Bitterness: 44.6 IBUs

Est Color: 5.2 SRM

Bitterness Ratio:  0.955

Again I chose to hop burst this beer. I like the results of this technique; smooth bitterness, at a lower apparent level. When we brewed this as an IPA we included a bittering addition of .25 oz. @ 60 minutes. this combined with an ounce of dry hops into a 3 gallon portion(the other 2 gallons went on mangos and oak) turned out to be a great IPA but not exactly what my target audience is looking for.

Citra IPA ( 5 gallon recipe)

11.5 lbs Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM) 90.2 %

10 oz Cara-Pils/Dextrine (2.0 SRM)  4.9 %

10 oz Caramel/Crystal Malt - 40L (40.0 SRM) 4.9%

0.25 oz Citra [10.00 %] (60 min) 8.5 IBU

2.00 oz Citra [10.00 %] (15 min) 33.8 IBU

2.50 oz Citra [11.00 %] (7 min) 25.1 IBU

1.25 oz Citra [11.00 %] (0 min) 0 IBU

1.0 oz Citra [11.00 %] (Dry Hop 14 days)

1 Pkgs American Ale (Wyeast Labs #1056) (1 liter starter shaken intermittently) 

Est Original Gravity: 1.060 SG

Est Final Gravity: 1.014 SG

Estimated Alcohol by Vol:  5.94 %

Bitterness: 67.4 IBU

Est Color: 7.2 SRM

Bitterness Ratio SG/IBU:  1.128

I loved this beer. It turned out to be fantastic. I will review this beer as a future post. If this beer had sucked, I probably wouldn’t be so enthusiastic about brewing. If you’re reading this thinking I want to make the jump to all grain, do your research, keep your first brew simple; I am glad I did.