So very little experience with pale ales. I am thinking about this malt bill. 3 gal batch 75% efficiency. 5.9oz pale 2 row, 1 oz Munich , 6oz Special B. 1.054OG 13.9SRM. My questions are the hops. Thinking of the lower IBU range at around 30 wondering if this IBU range would by to low for the malt bill. Thinking of staying the the C’s any suggestions.
For an APA I try to target only 10-15 IBU from the bittering addition (Chinook, CTZ, Centennial, etc.) and make up another 20-25 IBU with late additions. “C” hops are always good for flavor and aroma additions, but I also like to change it up by blending with Willamette or noble-type (Mt. Hood, Vanguard) if you’re into that sort of thing. 0.5-1 oz dry hop would be good too.
I’m thinking your math is off on the malt bill though. At 75% efficiency that would be about 1.007 OG.
Well…it depends how you use the hops. A beer with an OG of 1.054 that has a single addition of hops at the start of the boil resulting in 34 IBU of bitterness is going to taste different than the same beer with the 34 IBU resulting from a few different hop additions of the course of the boil.
For example, Sierra Nevada Pale Ale has an OG of 1.053 and about 34 IBU. So, with your OG, a bitterness level in the low 30’s will be fine. The one thing that SNPA does have is a lot of hop flavor resulting from a large addition of hops about 10 min before flame out. So you could say that the beer is not really that bitter in terms of IBU’s but it has a hefty amount of hop flavor that adds to the perception of “bitterness”.
Personally, my standard house APA has an OG of 1.054 and 34 IBUs or thereabouts and I follow the SNPA hop schedule and it seems to have a pretty good balance of malt and bitterness to those that try it. If I wanted to tone down the hop flavor a bit, I’d keep the same total IBUs but move the late hop addition earlier in the boil. That should keep the beer with a reasonable balance between malt sweetness and hop bitterness with more emphasis on the malt flavors.
In other words, as far as I’m concerned, you’re recipe seems very reasonable to me…that is as long as you fix your measurements. I think you mean to use 5 lb 9 oz of pale malt, right?
I truly appreciate it that helps with my understanding of hops and ya it’s 5lbs 9 oz oops. Never drink and post i should know that 
APA is one of my house styles and I like mine around 30IBU with an emphasis on the late additions as others have said. You really can’t go wrong though.
The Special B is going to give you an interesting roasty note in the malt flavor. I tend to use a lighter crystal to get more of a sweet caramel character. But I do change things up about every time I brew.
I like the Simcoe/Amarillo combo for finishing. I like to use a small addition of C40 or C60, but I would back ou the Special B if you do.
How much crystal do you like to use? 6-10%? My last pale ale used all Citra hops to about 40 IBUs, had about 10% munich and 5 or 6% crystal 55 fermented with wy1450. It’s delicious. Those Citra hops are quite bright and tasty.
