Bottled: Hoppy Gnome

Oliver the CatToday I bottled the first installment of my Hoppy Gnome IPA.  It’s a touch darker than I expected, but it smells and tastes great.  The Citra hop is definitely featured, as was the plan, with no hints of the “catty” aroma (cat piss) that sometime is associated with Citra.

I managed a solid 81.8% mash efficiency, with my starting and final gravities hitting within a measurement error of the targets.  At 7% ABV, it’ll pack a wallop, but it should be nicely balanced out by the 90.2 IBU’s of hops, plus a lot more aroma and dry hops that should make this a true hop bomb.   Continue reading

Brew Day – Hoppy Gnome IPA – 1/9/12

Today I brewed the first version of my Hoppy Gnome IPA.  It’s a modified version of a Green Flash West Coast IPA clone that I made a few months ago (the clone was actually my first all-grain batch and was very successful).  I dropped the amount of 60L crystal to lighten the color a bit, and swapped out some of the late hops for Citra.  I hope this will give it a softer hop profile. Continue reading