402: Colorado WCIPA Roundtable With Cannonball Creek, Westbound & Down, and Amalgam
Mar 1, 2025
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Join Brian Hutchinson from Cannonball Creek, Phil Joyce of Amalgam, and Jake Gardner from Westbound & Down as they dive deep into the world of West Coast IPAs. These medal-winning brewers share their secrets to crafting clean, flavorful beers, focusing on innovative techniques like decoction mashing and unique malt blends. They discuss the fine balance of hops, yeast health, and even the artistry of flavor communication. With a strong sense of camaraderie, they explore how friendly competition elevates their craft and creativity in the vibrant Colorado beer scene.
The importance of high-quality Pilsner malts is emphasized for creating clean bases in West Coast IPAs, enhancing flavor and drinkability.
Effective fermentation practices using Chico yeast are highlighted, ensuring low esters and preserving vibrant hop flavors for a crisp finish.
The brewers showcase innovation through the use of CO2 extract to enhance hop profiles while maintaining a balance between flavor and drinkability.
Deep dives
Insights on Brewing West Coast IPA
The podcast discusses the complexities of brewing West Coast IPA from a Colorado perspective, featuring insights from experienced brewers. They emphasize the significance of utilizing high-quality malt, primarily clean Pilsner malts, to create the right base for the beer. The conversation highlights the importance of drinkability, seeking to balance high hop saturation with accessibility for consumers. With awards highlighting their successes, the brewers stress continuous experimentation and adaptation in the brewing process to enhance flavor profiles.
Malt Selection and Recipe Development
The brewers delve into the selection of malt for their West Coast IPAs, underscoring how it shapes the beer's overall character. They focus on achieving low terminal gravity for a clean finish, which is essential for drinkability. They frequently blend various Pilsner malts to refine flavor and aroma, while considering how these choices impact the final product. Additionally, they discuss the use of techniques like decoction mashing to enhance malt richness and complexity in the beer.
Fermentation Practices
Fermentation is emphasized as a crucial aspect in the brewing of West Coast IPAs, particularly the yeast choices. The brewers primarily favor Chico yeast for its ability to produce clean profiles and minimize ester production, which could detract from hop flavors. They mention the importance of optimizing fermentation temperatures to ensure a crisp result, aiming for peak yeast health to maintain freshness. By managing fermentation effectively, they can capture the best hop expressions and flavors in their IPAs.
The Role of Hop Selection
Hop selection is a pivotal topic, with the brewers sharing their insights on balancing bitterness and hop flavor. They explore using both traditional bittering hops and modern varieties that contribute to unique flavor profiles. The goal is to select hops that provide punchy flavors while minimizing any vegetal characteristics. This involves a careful selection process, where they first deselect undesirable flavors before identifying hops that will enhance the beer's overall taste experience.
Innovations with CO2 Extract
The podcast introduces the use of CO2 extract as a method to enhance the hop profile in their beers. The brewers discuss how CO2 extract can deliver clean, sharp bitterness while allowing the hop aroma to shine through. By incorporating CO2 extract, they aim to create IPAs that are both flavorful and highly drinkable, paralleling the qualities of lagers. This innovative approach allows them to push the boundaries of hop flavor and aroma in their creations.
Culmination of Craft Beer Passion
Lastly, the brewers express their deep passion for craft beer and the continuous pursuit of quality in their brewing practices. They share the joy of collaboration and the inspiration they draw from each other's work, fostering a sense of community among Colorado brewers. The conversation captures the essence of not only brewing West Coast IPAs but also the culture surrounding craft beer, where learning and creativity are fundamental. Their commitment to excellence shines through as they strive to make the best possible versions of the style.
Strong brewing communities produce clusters of great breweries, and the Colorado brewing world, centered in Denver, is no different. Friendly competition drives innovation, exploration, and refinement as well as knowledgeable consumers with higher and higher expectations, and in this episode, we brought together three friends (each medal-winning brewers) for a conversation on their approach to West coast IPA.
Brian Hutchinson of Cannonball Creek has brought home a slew of medals in the pale ale space (11 total GABF and World Beer Cup medals between their pale ale and session IPA), and picked up a GABF gold medal last year for their New Zealand-style IPA. Jake Gardner of Westbound & Down has earned a handful of GABF and World Beer Cup medals for their West coast IPAs like Spirit of the West and Westbound Select. And Phil Joyce of Amalgam most recently brought home gold for West coast IPA in the Colorado Brewers Cup, after placing fourth at the Alpha King Challenge last year.
In this episode, the three move through a range of IPA brewing topics, including:
designing IPA with clean flavors that are easy to linguistically identify
decocting and step mashing WCIPA for higher attenuation, foam stability, and FAN uptake
building a malt base in WCIPA with blends of Pilsner malt
using flaked wheat in smaller percentages for mouthfeel
fermenting with Chico yeast for dry and low-ester beers
minimizing hop creep with ALDC, diacetyl-free yeast, and other yeast health tools
driving faster and healthier fermentations for more vibrant hop character
understand the impact of water on WCIPA
integrating flavor and bitterness
the impact of pH on hop expression
selecting loud hops that punch hard
And more.
This episode is brought to you by:
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