Salt 'Tram' double NEIPA

[DocAnna]

I'm having a bit of fun at the moment trying to replicate a recipe from the rather brilliant Salt brewery Home - SALT Beer Factory and plan on making this my next brew.

Genuinely a bit of a fan of their beers, one of their NEIPA's 'Tram' was the first NEIPA I tried and remains a favourite. I'm now even more impressed after emailing asking about some hints to the recipe and Colin Stronge, their head brewer, generously sending me the details of the grain bill, hop additions, OG, FG and IBU. Just trying now to work out how an 80 deg hop stand with 100g of Sabro can contribute so little to the IBU - I'm aiming for 15.

From Brewfather's calculations even 15 min at 80 will exceed that as an IBU, so I'm reckoning on adding the Sabro at 80, letting it passively cool v slowly for 15 -20 min then actively cool. I'm not really an expert on hop stands, I'll post the whole recipe once I reckon it's ok but any ideas on the hopstand - do I hold at 80 for 10 min to technically obtain the right level then rapidly cool, or just go with rough estimates instead?

Anna

 

[DocAnna]

On reflection, thought it would only be fair to post Colin's original recipe. It doesn't specify a yeast so I'm planning on using White Labs WLP067 coastal haze - since to achieve the theoretical ABV the yeast needs at bit more than 80% attenuation and the coastal haze, according to spec anyway, has an attenuation of 82%. I'm also using Crafty Maltster's Pops pale malt since I have plenty of it:

Beer Spec	Malt:	Kettle hops:	Dry Hop
ABV 8.0 OG 1.075 FG 1.014 IBU 15 EBC 13	Extra pale 79% Golden Naked Oats 10.5% Jumbo Oats 10.5%	No Bittering addition Cool wort post boil to 80c then add: Sabro 5g/l	Amarillo 7.5g/l Nelson Sauvin 5g/l Mosaic 2.5g/l

My version below from Brewfather - which quotes 8.1% but that's only if I hit all my values spot on. This is going to my first NEIPA so looking for a bit of advice on the dry hop timing, duration and water profile as well. I've currently gone with Brewfather's built in 'Hoppy NEIPA' which from what I've read looks ok but any advice much appreciated.

Water Profile
Ca2+ 100, Mg2+ 9, Na+ 6, Cl- 118, SO42- 93, HCO3- 43

Thank you lots

Anna

Salt Tram Double NEIPA
New England IPA
8.1% / 18.2 °P
Recipe by
Colin Stronge
All Grain
BrewZilla / RoboBrew 35L
75% efficiency
Batch Volume: 20 L
Boil Time: 60 min
Mash Water: 25.6 L
Sparge Water: 3.54 L
Total Water: 29.14 L
Boil Volume: 24.88 L
Pre-Boil Gravity: 1.066
Vitals
Original Gravity: 1.075
Final Gravity: 1.013
IBU (Tinseth): 17
Color: 12.6 EBC

Mash
Temperature — 65 °C — 60 min
Malts (6.57 kg)
5.19 kg (79%) — Crafty Maltsters Pop's Pale Ale Malt — Grain — 5.4 EBC
690 g (10.5%) — Simpsons Oats Golden Naked — Grain — 18 EBC
690 g (10.5%) — Oats, Flaked — Grain — 2 EBC
Hops (380 g)
100 g (17 IBU) — Sabro 14% — Aroma — 15 min hopstand at 80 deg C
140 g — Amarillo 9.2% — Dry Hop — day 5
100 g — Nelson Sauvin 12% — Dry Hop — day 5
40 g — Mosaic 12.25% — Dry Hop — day 5

Hopstand at 80 °C

Yeast
1 pkg — White Labs WLP067 Coastal Haze Ale Blend 82%

Fermentation
Primary — 20 °C — 14 days
Carbonation: 2.4 CO2-vol

 

[Sadfield]

Top bloke, Colin. Always happy to help homebrewers and one of the best brewers in the country.

 

[Sadfield]

Just remembered that Colin did a brew along on twitter in the first lockdown, of Salt Ikat. If you didn't see it, search twitter for #saltbrewalong @saltbeerfactory. It might give more of an insight to their process.

Your steep plans look okay to me. IBU calculations can be random, depending on which formula is used. Kit plays a big part and I suspect you won't get better extraction than Salts commercial kit.

 

[grooves]

I wouldn't sweat the hop stand - just make sure the wort is below 85c and leave the hops for around 20mins.

I had good results using WLP067 on my recent NEIPA. I got 76% attenuation, but I'm not sure I trust my OG reading so it may have been more.

 

[Northern_Brewer]

It doesn't specify a yeast

"London Fog is the house strain" (ie WLP066)

I wouldn't get too hung up on things like the hopstand - so much of brewing is process-specific that it's hard to replicate between different commercial setups let alone moving down to homebrew scale, so there's an element of try it the way that's easiest on your equipment, then make it more difficult for yourself if you need to.

 

[DocAnna]

"London Fog is the house strain" (ie WLP066)

I wouldn't get too hung up on things like the hopstand - so much of brewing is process-specific that it's hard to replicate between different commercial setups let alone moving down to homebrew scale, so there's an element of try it the way that's easiest on your equipment, then make it more difficult for yourself if you need to.

Doh - I really should have looked before ordering my yeast! Oh well I guess it'll have a bit more of a pineapple taste than planned. I was aiming to overbuild the starter and using it for the next NEIPA as well.

Anna

 

[grooves]

Bear in mind WLP067 is a blend - so if you reuse it the different strains may have grown/survived differently resulting in different ratios to one another so the flavour of the resulting beer may be different. I've frozen some samples so will decide to either build up from the sample, or grow up from a single colony either way it will be different - but free yeast!

 

[dan125]

Recipe looks great
I've not tried the beer you are emulating but the sulphate level in your water profile looks a bit high for a neipa. I'd consider bringing it down - after several attempts at neipas I've found keeping it as low as possible helps with the soft mouthfeel and I now just keep it at the baseline level in Ashbeck at 10ppm.

 

[Brew_DD2]

All sounds great Anna. As others have said, don't sweat the hopstand too much. I tend to chill to around 80c then turn the chiller off for 15-20 minutes. With the amount of dry hops you'll be using, 10 degrees here or there will not make a big difference.

You're nailing the most important things (minimising O2 exposure, massive dry hop charge etc.) and the hotside and yeast management stuff you have loads of experience with. It'll come out great.

I personally find getting the dry hop additions in a couple of days before racking to the keg, as you are dropping the temp for a cold crash, gives the brightest hop flavour and aroma. I also really enjoy keg hopping, but that's maybe one to try on another day.

2:1 Chloride:Sulphate works well for me too, but again, don't sweat it too much. You've got this!

 

[DocAnna]

All sounds great Anna. As others have said, don't sweat the hopstand too much. I tend to chill to around 80c then turn the chiller off for 15-20 minutes. With the amount of dry hops you'll be using, 10 degrees here or there will not make a big difference.

You're nailing the most important things (minimising O2 exposure, massive dry hop charge etc.) and the hotside and yeast management stuff you have loads of experience with. It'll come out great.

I personally find getting the dry hop additions in a couple of days before racking to the keg, as you are dropping the temp for a cold crash, gives the brightest hop flavour and aroma. I also really enjoy keg hopping, but that's maybe one to try on another day.

2:1 Chloride:Sulphate works well for me too, but again, don't sweat it too much. You've got this!

You are so encouraging! Thank you, this feels a bit of a big one getting a NEIPA right... I might be blowing this up out of proportion but it feels both a real challenge and something I might actually be able to do now.

Anna

 

[DocAnna]

Re the water profile, thanks for the advice on lowering the Chloride and the 2:1 ratio @dan125 and @Brew_DD2 I've tweaked the additions to reach:
Ca 100, Mg18, Na 16, Cl 178, SO4 87, HCO3 22

Our source water is ridiculously soft, so getting the chloride up without adding too much of the cations is challenging.
Ca 5, Mg 1, Na 8, Cl 13, SO4 2, HCO3 22

Anna

 

[chillipickle]

Im sure you will brew a great neipa anna, i done my first neipa a couple of weeks a go.I followed a recipe and water profile so can't take any credit for that side of the brew.
I done the closed transfer from snub nose to flushed corny, sanitised corny witth starsan. Emptied, then added 3g of sodium metabisulphate and filled with water, purged the keg with co2.

Fair play for wanting to brew an 8.1% neipa, mine came out at 6.3%, next time i brew it i am going to try to get it under 6%.It came out really nice for a first go, so juicy and goes down far to easy.

Let us know how your brew goes....pic of nearly 2 weeks in the keg.

 

[Brew_DD2]

Re the water profile, thanks for the advice on lowering the Chloride and the 2:1 ratio @dan125 and @Brew_DD2 I've tweaked the additions to reach:
Ca 100, Mg18, Na 16, Cl 178, SO4 87, HCO3 22

Our source water is ridiculously soft, so getting the chloride up without adding too much of the cations is challenging.
Ca 5, Mg 1, Na 8, Cl 13, SO4 2, HCO3 22

Anna

I love having soft, low-mineral tap water. Gives us a great blank canvas to work from. Easier to add calcium chloride, epsom and gypsum, than dilute them out in my opinion.

 

[Brew_DD2]

When are you planning to get this one on then Anna?

 

[DocAnna]

When are you planning to get this one on then Anna?

I've an IPA in the snubnose at the moment, cold crash from yesterday and had hoped to keg today but a lot of the hops are still on the surface, I'm planning on checking again this evening. I'm also waiting on delivery of the yeast and oats, which should be this week, so most likely next weekend for the Tram which will give me time to get the yeast starter built up over the week.

Anna

 

[WonkyDonkey]

@DocAnna Looking forward to seeing how this goes. I too have a Robobrew and up until now have held off trying to brew a Double IPA due to the larger grain bills and potential drop in efficiency. Have got one planned in for a few weeks time so hoping to learn from your experience.
Good luck with it