Author: Marshall Schott

True story: I have a neighbor who flies F-15 fighter jets for a living, the walls of his in-house bar adorned with plaques and rad photos way cooler than the cover of Top Gun. A couple years ago, I built Jersey, as he’s known at work, a 3 tap keezer that he keeps stocked with commercial kegs of a popular Witbier and something easy drinking like Firestone-Walker DBA or 805. Out of the third tap always flows a tasty IPA such as Ballast Point Sculpin, Firestone-Walker Double Jack, or some other West Coast example of the style. Due to his odd work schedule, Jersey isn’t able to lend me his palate too often, but he happened to be around while I was collecting data for the flaked oats xBmt, the first NEIPA I’d ever made. After completing the survey, I offered him a full pint, which he gladly accepted. Now, this isn’t a dude who spends hours researching different beer styles or posting masturbatory tasting notes to review websites, he just loves good beer, which is largely why the comment he made following his first non-evaluative sip caught me off-guard.

“This is so juicy I could drink it for breakfast!”

I proceeded to explain to him what New England IPA is and how it differs from the IPA he’s used to drinking, namely in regards to appearance and that “juicy” character he noted. With results from that xBmt showing flaked oats didn’t produce a distinguishable difference, my focus shifted to another method used by brewers of NEIPA that’s believed to contribute to its unique character.

Simply put, biotransformation is said to occur as a result of the interaction of hop oils and active yeast, leading to a transformation of certain terpenoids into terpenoids that weren’t originally present. A fascinating concept that many have posited may be responsible for the qualitative differences between New England and other styles of IPA.

| PURPOSE |

To evaluate the differences between beers where the dry hops were added at either high kräusen (biotransformation) or at the end of fermentation (standard).

| METHODS |

Designing this xBmt required enough consideration to make it a royal pain in the ass. After consulting with a bunch of people, it was ultimately decided that brewing the standard dry hop batch two days before the biotransformation batch would be the most prudent approach, as it would allow both to be dry hopped and packaged at the same time, eliminating dry hop contact duration as a confounding variable. Because of this, I ended up brewing the same exact beer 2 days apart, which on its own ostensibly introduced other potential factors that could have impacted the results. I’ll do my best to address this stuff where necessary, though in order to keep this section from getting to palaverous, I’ve opted not to fully detail both brew days.

I based the current recipe on the first NEIPA I made for the flaked oats xBmt, making a couple minor changes based on ingredient availability and numerous recommendations I received to double dry hop.

NE(ver) Clear IPA

Recipe Details Batch Size Boil Time IBU SRM Est. OG Est. FG ABV 5.5 gal 30 min 47.9 IBUs 3.7 SRM 1.056 1.013 5.7 % Actuals 1.056 1.011 5.9 % Fermentables Name Amount % Pale Malt (2 Row), Rahr 11 lbs 88 Oats, Flaked 1.5 lbs 12 Hops Name Amount Time Use Form Alpha % Columbus/Tomahawk/Zeus (CTZ) 8 g 30 min First Wort Pellet 13.1 Centennial 30 g 15 min Boil Pellet 8.8 Centennial 30 g 5 min Boil Pellet 9.9 Citra 30 g 5 min Boil Pellet 14 Mosaic 30 g 5 min Boil Pellet 10.5 Citra 60 g 6 days Dry Hop Pellet 14 Centennial 30 g 6 days Dry Hop Pellet 8.8 Mosaic 30 g 6 days Dry Hop Pellet 10.5 Citra 33 g 4 days Dry Hop Pellet 14 Centennial 22 g 4 days Dry Hop Pellet 8.8 Mosaic 20 g 4 days Dry Hop Pellet 10.5 Yeast Name Lab Attenuation Temperature London Ale III (1318) Wyeast Labs 73% 64°F - 74°F Notes Water Profile: Ca 135 | Mg 1 | Na 10 | SO4 71 | Cl 186 | pH 5.4



Again, weighing the pros and cons, I decided to make a single large starter, half of which would be pitched into the standard dry hop batch while the other half would be left in the flask two more days before being pitched. Based on speculation that biotransformation occurs as a function of yeast strain, I made a starter using 2 packs of the popular-for-the-style Wyeast 1318 London Ale III a couple days before brewing the standard dry hop batch.

For each batch, I prepared the brewing liquor and milled the grain the night prior to brewing.

I awoke early on a Saturday morning then again the following Monday morning, in each instance starting my brew day by lighting the burner under my kettle full of liquor.

Once heated to a bit above my target strike temperature, I transferred the water to my mash tun, let it sit for a 5 minute preheat, then incorporated the grist to hit the same desired mash temperature in each batch.

Both beers were brewed using the no sparge method and were left for precisely the same 60 minute saccharification rest.

At the completion of the mash step, the same volume of sweet wort was collected in a bucket and transferred to a kettle.

Both worts were boiled for 60 minutes with hops being added at the same times in each.

I quickly chilled each batch of wort as soon as the boil was over.

Refractometer readings revealed the standard dry hop wort clocked in with slightly lower OG than the wort that would receive the biotransformation dry hop addition.

For the sake of consistency, I allowed both fermentors of wort to sit in a chamber controlled to my target fermentation temperature of 66°F/19°C for 3 hours before pitching the yeast. At the time I pitched the biotransformation wort, the kräusen on the standard dry hop beer was beginning to fade. The following day, I noticed the biontransformation batch was beginning to develop a kräusen, though it had yet to achieve the rocky appearance I was waiting for. Approximately 40 hours after pitching, the biotransformation beer had achieved high kräusen and the standard dry hop batch appeared close to being done fermenting.

I proceeded to dry hop both batches with the same amount of hops, giving each a very gentle swirl to ensure they didn’t remain on top of the beer. After 2 more days, I raised the temperature of each chamber to 72°F/22°C to encourage complete attenuation of the beers. Finally, another 2 days later, when fermentation on both beers looked to be dying down, I took hydrometer measurements that revealed the biotransformation batch still had a little ways to go.

Another round of hydrometer measurements the following evening revealed the biotransformation beer had indeed dropped to 1.012 FG, just 0.001 SG higher than the standard dry hop beer. At this point, I added the second dry hop dose and left the beers alone for 2 days before an overnight cold crash then transferring to kegs.

The filled kegs were placed in my keezer on higher pressure for a 24 hours burst carbonation, after which I reduced to serving pressure and let them condition cold for 4 days before serving them to participants. At this point, the beers were surprisingly easy to tell apart by appearance alone, the standard dry hop sample noticeably darker and a touch clearer than the biotransformation beer.

Two weeks after data collection was complete, I poured myself a couple more samples just to see how things were progressing. The difference in clarity left me feeling somewhat hopeful.

| RESULTS |

A total of 28 people of varying levels of experience participated in this xBmt. Each participant was served 1 sample of the biotransformation dry hop beer and 2 samples of the standard dry hop beer then asked to identify the sample that was unique. Given the sample size, 15 tasters (p<0.05) would have had to correctly identify the biotransformation beer as being different in order to reach statistical significance. A total of 11 tasters (p=0.31) accurately identified the unique sample, indicating participants in this xBmt were unable to reliably distinguish a NEIPA dry hopped during high kräusen from one dry hopped toward the end of fermentation.

To satiate curious minds, and because I think it’s sort of telling, I’ll share the preference data that’s arguably meaningless given the non-significant results. Of the 11 participants who were correct on the triangle test, 5 reported preferring the biotransformation beer, 4 liked the standard dry hop beer more, and 2 felt they weren’t different.

My Impressions: After my first experience brewing a NEIPA, I was pretty stoked to get these beers on tap, not only because I enjoyed drinking that first batch, but because I really thought this variable might help explain some of the unique aspects of this style. I poured my first few samples in clear glasses while the beers were still cold conditioning and based on appearances alone, I was pretty certain I’d be able to tell them apart, the standard dry hop beer noticeably darker and less “juicy” looking than the biontransformation beer. Fully owning that I preferred the look of the biotransformation beer, I was curious to see how I’d perform on a series of semi-blind triangle tests. Over the course of a few days, I made 8 attempts, out of which I was correct 5 times. It wasn’t easy, there were a few times I threw my hands up and guessed luckily, and ultimatley, 5/8 is 1 shy of significant. The only difference I felt I could pick up was a slightly more malty character in the standard dry hop beer, not that it wasn’t as hoppy as the biotransformation beer, just that it had a whisper more malt presence.

Unlike my first NEIPA, I wasn’t a huge fan of this beer. It actually reminded me of a few commercial examples of the style, way too soft on the palate with a much stronger pine character I can only attribute to the use of Mosaic instead of Galaxy.

| DISCUSSION |

I think every researcher, whether of the garage or lab variety, yearns for that eureka moment when results confirm a hypothesis. This was certainly the case for me with this xBmt– after demonstrating that neither the absence of fining nor flaked oats were responsible for the “juicy” character common to NEIPA, at least on their own, I’d all but convinced myself the culprit was biotransformation dry hopping. Suffice to say, the fact tasters were unable to reliably distinguish a beer dry hopped at high kräusen from one dry hopped at the end of fermentation really surprised me. However, the fact the biotransformation beer maintained a noticeable and familiar haze while the standard dry hop batch was clearer is pretty exciting, as it demonstrates dry hopping during high kräusen may in fact be one part of the NEIPA gestalt.

My hunch is the haze in the biotransformation beer is what made it appear lighter in color than the beer that was dry hopped at the end of fermentation. An interesting observation, regardless. The biotransformation beer definitely looks more like a typical NEIPA with its creamy orange hue, supporting previous findings that something occurs when dry hopping at high kräusen. Admittedly, this made me wonder the extent to which perceptions and subsequent descriptions of this style are influenced purely by the way the beer looks– like orange juice.

I’m not sure if it was my use of Pale malt instead of Maris Otter, Mosaic instead of Galaxy, a lower percentage of flaked oats, or all combined, but my experience with these beers on a sensory level was rather disappointing. Thankfully, Jersey really enjoyed them and while I remain committed to exploring the individual unique components involved in making NEIPA, I think I’ll take a break and make some higher sulfate, NOat, West Coast IPA to clear my hazy head.

If you have any thoughts about this xBmt, please do not hesitate to share in the comments section below!

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