I was thinking about doing a few SMaSH beers with extra light (100% 2-row) LME to get familiar with some of the newer hop breeds out there. I’d targeted Meridian and Denali hops to start with, just since they sounded interesting and I don’t know much about them (whereas I’ve had plenty of beers that highlight cascade, simcoe, azacca, galaxy, mosaic, citra, etc).
Anyway, here’s my basic recipe (for the Meridian version). Please feel free to chime in with any ideas/corrections:
Recipe Type: Extract Yeast: Safale US-05 Yeast Starter: Nah Batch Size (Gallons): 5 gal Original Gravity: 1.048 Final Gravity: 1.007 IBU: 42 Boiling Time (Minutes): 60 Color: 4-5 Primary Fermentation (# of Days & Temp): 14 days at 65-68F
7 lbs. Extra Light LME (4-4.5 SRM)
1.50 oz Meridian [7.00 %] - Boil 60 min
0.50 oz Meridian [7.00 %] - Boil 15 min
0.50 oz Meridian [7.00 %] - Boil 10 min
0.50 oz Meridian [7.00 %] - Boil 1 min
1.00 oz Meridian [7.00 %] - Dry Hop 7.0 Days
When I “play” with hops to learn more about them, it’s generally in the aroma / flavor area.
Somewhere between SMaSH and “dry hop bud light” (link, link), there is another option that I use. I brew a basic clean ale recipe ale, then dry hop it different ways in secondary fermentation using smaller containers:
Pale Ale Malt or light DME to 1.044 OG,
a clean bitter hop to get about 30 IBUs (Magnum or Warrior)
US-05 yeast
then dry hop in various hop combinations and volumes.
I’ve found that three bottles of any specific combination is generally enough to get an initial feel for the hop. So with a five gallon batch, that’s as many as 15 different dry hop combinations that could be covered in the same batch.
Stop by a couple bar and/or restaurants and ask to have them save a couple gallon pickle/olive jars…drill a hole in the lid…put a grommet & an airlock … Use Saran Wrap on the outside of the lid after putting in on to get a better seal…you can then split a 5 gallon batch into 5 different vessels for different dry hopping.
