Liberty Citra Imperial IPA

[Sam DT]

As a few of us have discussed this is an outstanding beer that definitely needs cloning...

Joe if you're out there somewhere still feel free to nudge us in the right direction, although we wouldn't begrudge you for wanting to keep such a top recipe under your hat...

Have at it!

[Sam DT]

So, after an ill-conceived first test batch (never brewed an imperial before so ended up with way too much specialty) here's what I have in the fermentor at the moment...

Aerated well and did a full re-pitch out from under a citra-zythos NZ-pils that I've been working on.

Mashed at 64 for two hours to increase ferment-ability.

OG Target 1.080

FG Target 1.012

Final Volume 23 Liters

Fermenting at 18 deg and will ramp to 23 after fermentation settles down

Didn't account for the dilution effect of the two liters of yeast slurry I pitched so ended up with OG of 1.076 after initially diluting from 1.086, also ended up using Munich instead of Vienna as the local was out - but having just looked at the liberty website it looks like they use Munich anyway.

If you're looking to burn your monthly brew budget in a single brew this is the way to go - think it came in at around $120 for the ingredients alone... Will write back with results & may chuck a couple of bottles in NHC if it comes out ok.

39.00 l	Christchurch NZ	Water	1	-
6.00 g	Epsom Salt (MgSO4) (Mash 60.0 mins)	Water Agent	2	-
6.00 g	Gypsum (Calcium Sulfate) (Mash 60.0 mins)	Water Agent	3	-
4.00 g	Calcium Chloride (Mash 60.0 mins)	Water Agent	4	-
8.50 kg	Gladfield American Ale Malt (5.0 EBC)	Grain	5	85.9 %
0.50 kg	Gladfield Toffee Malt (10.5 EBC)	Grain	6	5.1 %
0.40 kg	Gladfield Vienna Malt (7.0 EBC)	Grain	7	4.0 %
0.30 kg	Gladfield Wheat Malt (4.2 EBC)	Grain	8	3.0 %
0.20 kg	Gladfield Sour Grapes Malt (4.0 EBC)	Grain	9	2.0 %
30.00 g	Warrior [16.50 %] - Boil 60.0 min	Hop	10	43.5 IBUs
0.72 Items	Whirlfloc Tablet (Boil 15.0 mins)	Fining	11	-
35.00 g	Citra [12.00 %] - Boil 15.0 min	Hop	12	18.3 IBUs
35.00 g	Zythos [10.90 %] - Boil 15.0 min	Hop	13	16.7 IBUs
70.00 g	Citra [12.00 %] - Boil 5.0 min	Hop	14	14.7 IBUs
70.00 g	Zythos [10.90 %] - Boil 5.0 min	Hop	15	13.4 IBUs
60.00 g	Citra [12.00 %] - Boil 0.0 min	Hop	16	0.0 IBUs
60.00 g	Zythos [10.90 %] - Boil 0.0 min	Hop	17	0.0 IBUs
1.0 pkg	California Ale (White Labs #WLP001) [35.49 ml]	Yeast	18	-
30.00 g	Citra [12.00 %] - Dry Hop 7.0 Days	Hop	19	0.0 IBUs
30.00 g	Zythos [8.70 %] - Dry Hop 7.0 Days	Hop	20	0.0 IBUs
30.00 g	Citra [12.00 %] - Dry Hop 4.0 Days	Hop	21	0.0 IBUs
30.00 g	Zythos [8.70 %] - Dry Hop 4.0 Days	Hop	22	0.0 IBUs

[Pierre Malan]

Thanks for tackling this ... C!tra is one of my favourite beers, I'm keen to tackle some of the clones once you report back

Looking forward to your tasting notes!

[Pierre Malan]

Also, from their facebook page: C!tra has 12.5g of hops in every bottle.

Presumably that is 25g/litre ... which stacks up with half a kilo for a homebrew batch size

from their website

9% abv, 99 IBU, Malts: Pale Ale, munich, crystal, brewers extract

[Sam DT]

Sweet, my actual batch size is 25L (put 23 above) so that gives 19.2 g/L so still a little short - and here was me thinking that was a crazy amount of hops...

Calculated IBUs came in at 104 but from what I hear you can't really taste the difference over 100. With the extra dilution to 1.076 I should come in around 8.6%

I generally use gladfield toffee as a sub for pale crystal malt and as above ended up using Munich instead of the planned Vienna. As for the wheat it's a remnant from the base recipe I started with but should add a bit of mouth feel. In terms of the brewers extract I wonder if that's just standard malt extract?

[Sam DT]

Pulled a hydro sample this morning - down to 1.014 after 10 days so pretty happy with attenuation, even if it stops here I think it should be reasonable. Sample was tasting good - even though it was flat wasn't overly sweet or cloying which I think is the key to C!tras drink-ability. Will start dry hopping on Tuesday (day 14) give it 7 days then cold crash for 2-3 days and then hit with gelatin as I want it as clean as possible. 

[Pierre Malan]

Looking forward to tasting notes ... thanks fro the update

[Dyl]

Just ordered the grain/ hops for this!

How did it turn out?

One thing, when I punch all that into beersmith I get estimated OG of 1.091 and final of 1.020 which gives est ABV of 9.3%

thanks for putting the recipe up

[Sam DT]

Hey,

Kegging tomorrow so will report back Sunday, also will be entering it for the Christchurch club case swap in a couple of weeks so should get some good feedback for further tweaking then.

This is for 25 liters and 66% efficiency, two hour mash at 64.4

Does that get you there?

[Dyl]

ah right sounds good, I did it for 25L but had efficiency set at 75%.

I tend to lose efficiency with the big brews so your numbers seem good!

[Sam DT]

Well here it is...

Really enjoying it - had to go back for another half glass even tho it's a school night so that's a good sign, at least as far as the beer is concerned... . Overall stoked! She's a very tasty drop.

Jumping the gun a little here as it's only been in the keg a few days but putting my critical hat on and thinking about how to make it more like C!itra (not that I've had it side by side yet)... I think the aroma and flavor could still come through a bit stronger maybe some mosaic or something similar to really re-enforce the mango hit would be worth while, also perhaps it would be worth dropping the wheat in favor of a touch more toffee/crystal however it could just be the pine notes coming through a little strong from the Zythos. Having recently looked at a few other IIPA recipies recently US05 might be the go to get those last few points over the line. Will be interesting to see how it's drinking in a few weeks time.

Anyway in the interests of some honest well informed feedback I'm putting a dozen into to the Christchurch brew club case swap next week so will come back with feedback and suggestions received.

Looking forward to hearing how others go with this

[Dyl]

that looks fantastic!

I brewed mine on Sunday, brew day went well, I hit all my numbers, OG was around the 1.090 mark. Its sitting in the fermentor at the moment. Im just going to do one big dry hop as Im too lazy to do 2.

Smells great already

[Pierre Malan]

Looks really good - will wait for some suggestions to tweak the recipe and then have a crack at brewing it.  Well don!