This recipe was inspired by "Evil Twin" from JZ/Heretic Brewing, which is a totally late-hopped American amber. I like the idea behind the late hops, to get big flavor and aroma (and a pretty high IBU) without adding much palate wrecking "actual" bitterness from the hops. I've been sitting on this recipe for a while now, so I am pretty excited to see how it pans out. I give you:
Mashed between 152-154 for an hour, mashed out at 168 for 15 minutes, and boiled for roughly 80 minutes (for the sake of OG and volume). Was at an OG of 1.062 at that point, which is slightly higher than I wanted, but I didn't feel like adding more water back at the end since I was at my target volume.
the "real" Evil Twin isn't dry hopped, so this first run I am not going to either. the hope is for a nice hop punch in the palate with a complex malt background from the melange of specialty grains (without being muddled).
update 6/9/2013: The airlock is bubbling like a machine gun...it is freakin' loud! I guess the slurry was plenty viable, so I'm thinking that this will pretty much be good to go into the keg around the 22nd-23rd.
update 6/26/2013: gravity reading was 1.014...so it is DONE! kegged it up. :-)
crud. I somehow managed to NOT take any notes on this beer, so this will be from memory. the aroma was a blend of earthy-dank and grapefruit peel, and the taste followed suit with background notes of caramel and a touch of roasted nuts...I really liked the base beer, and I think it will go great with some other hop combinations in the future. I've come to realize that my Apollo and Columbus hops are pretty similar, and that's a shame IMO. the Apollo have an amazing orange note during dry hopping, and for, no joke, like the 1st day of drinking (if that occurs within a month of brew day). then that fades away entirely, leaving a dankness for the remainder of the beer's life. it's not bad, but when combined with Columbus, it is redundant. I think some bright citrusy hops will blend nicely with this recipe after omitting either one of the danky hops.
also, this entirely late-hopped beer loses hop character FAST! if you are gonna brew it, make sure you drink it in a hurry, as of today (August 19th) it has degraded into basic APA territory, whereas it had a pretty nice punch early on (mid July).
so it was a fun experiment, but this beer is all about timing, and it has lasted way too long on tap thanks to vacations and such. it really is a pretty color though ;-)