IPA or IPL

BilltownBrewingCo

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Hey all, been a minute.

Recipe for 5ish gallons:

1/2 weyermann barke pilsner malt 1/2 golden promise malt bill

Boil for 60-90 minutes depending on mash efficiency, but no hops until

1oz Simcoe w/ 20 minutes left

6oz citra whirlpool

2oz Mosaic dry hop

All hops are pellets.


What I am questioning is if I should go with my standard IPA/PA house strain (Voss Kveik, I think I'm on Gen 4 or 5) or if I hit it with some bohemian lager yeast. I've had success doing some good malty lagers, and a czech pils, but just curious if anyone else has been happy with an IPL vs IPA.

thanks all!
 
I'd prefer IPA - I feel that the high hopping rate of an IPx needs the estery-sweet characteristics of an ale rather than the clean fermentation profile of a lager. IPLs to me come across as harsh unless you load them up with character malts - crystal or caramel - kind of defeating the purpose of lagering. That's my take, use these numbers for comparison, actual mileage may vary....
 
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I love the idea of an IPL but that might too many hops. I think the goal with an IPL is for the malt and lager characteristics to still come through but be balanced as best you can by a strong hop profile. Basically a bitter german pils with american hops and possibly some dry hoping. Just my perspective as I do a hoppy lager that probably isn't quite in IPL territory.
 
I wonder about the lager in the IPL name. If it's just that a lager yeast was used, that's fine, but the behaviour of various strains within the two families is so mixed about it doesn't necessarily mean that much.

For me, as long as you're not lagering a hoppy beer I don't see a problem. And I've been enjoying a bunch of hoppy beers with those types of grists recently. I prefer either a balanced or slightly calcium chloride focused water profile for those to emphasis the malt and decent attenuation, so maybe a step or longer mash. Though I just use one of the clean ale strains, maybe a slightly warmer fermentation will also give you a bit of yeast character that would work with the beer.
 
I love the idea of an IPL but that might too many hops. I think the goal with an IPL is for the malt and lager characteristics to still come through but be balanced as best you can by a strong hop profile. Basically a bitter german pils with american hops and possibly some dry hoping. Just my perspective as I do a hoppy lager that probably isn't quite in IPL territory.
Back in the bad old days when I lived there, a standard German Pilsner was about 45 IBUs. I liked those bitter pilsners! I'd also think much more than that would start to get harsh - not enough maltiness to support the bitterness AND it was all boil hops.

Also, lagering precipitates some of the hop oils out.... Here's what I've done along those lines:

https://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/recipe/view/419035/german-style-pale-lagered-ale

It made a really good beer as I remember and I may have to do it again! As mentioned above, I wouldn't go over 45 IBUs with it, though. And I'd adjust the mash pH to around 5.3.
 
Back in the bad old days when I lived there, a standard German Pilsner was about 45 IBUs. I liked those bitter pilsners! I'd also think much more than that would start to get harsh - not enough maltiness to support the bitterness AND it was all boil hops.

Also, lagering precipitates some of the hop oils out.... Here's what I've done along those lines:

https://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/recipe/view/419035/german-style-pale-lagered-ale

It made a really good beer as I remember and I may have to do it again! As mentioned above, I wouldn't go over 45 IBUs with it, though. And I'd adjust the mash pH to around 5.3.

Yeah I like the bitter pils as well. My house version calculates to 42 IBUs but not sure how accurate that is...

Yours looks great! Probably more hop character than mine.

Here's mine:
https://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/recipe/edit/302575

Really like the yeast combo of M76 and S-189.

I think you could easily swap out the hop varieties and do something in "IPL" territory especially with an added dry hop however I wouldn't go with anything overly aggressive and new school. Sorry to deviate.
 
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