About two years ago, a friend of mine got married. I was a relatively inexperienced homebrewer then, but my previous few beers turned out quite alright, so though I’d be bold and try to… *gasp* design my own IPA recipe as a wedding present!

I looked at existing recipes, how they were put together, and then I checked what was available from the homebrewing online store of my choice, and chose a few things that sounded good to me. I emphasize “sounded” because I had really only read about different hop and malt varieties, and recommended yeast strains for IPAs, but that was it.

Grist:

• 85 % Pale Ale Malt
• 10 % Vienna Malt
• 5 % CaraHell

Hops:

• 1.5 g/l Summit (15% AA) @ 60 min
• 1.5 g/l Cascade (5.8% AA) @ 10 min
• 1.5g/l East Kent Goldings (4.8% AA) @ 14 days dry-hopping
• 1.5g/l Cascade (5.8% AA) @ 14 days dry-hopping
• 1g/l Summit (15% AA) @ 14 days dry-hopping

90 minute mash at 68 °C, then 60 minutes of boiling. US-05 yeast. OG was 16.5 °P, FG was 4°P.

Fortunately, the result was a big success. I haven’t brewed it since then, but I’m still astonished how well this beer turned out to be. A bit of a lucky shot, but whatever. Just don’t ask me why I put it together like that. If I designed an American IPA recipe nowadays, I wouldn’t do things too differently, though.