Today 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 →