Maris Otter/Citra SMaSH

A few years ago the Citra hop took the craft beer and, as a result, homebrewing world by storm.  Amidst this storm I decided that I should buy an ounce Citra here, a pound there, and another ounce somewhere else.  Basically anytime I ordered ingredients I checked to see if there was any Citra in stock, and if yes, I bought it. I'm also pretty sure I did all this prior to ever tasting a beer with it. Yes, I was a bandwagon fanboy of the Citra hop.

After a couple months of accumulation, and being a college student who brewed in his apartment, his parents house in New Jersey, and a family vacation home in Pennsylvania, I managed to leave a breadcrumb trail of Citra in every location I've been.  So fast forward a few years.  I moved out of my college apartment, and my family cleaned out their freezers.  This gave me a surplus of Citra hops that I never knew I had.  After having Three Floyds Zombie Dust, Surly Abrasive Ale, and Kern River Citra, all of which showcase Citra extremely well, I wanted to do something that used Citra exclusively.  I've used it multiple times mixed with other hops in IPA or yeast forward beers like Saison, but never alone.  I also had never done a single malt beer.  So I thought it would be fitting to do a SMaSH beer with Maris Otter malt and Citra hops.

Maris Otter is English pale malt.  It's know to be slightly darker and impart more of a toasty, bready character that traditional US 2-Row. I thought this would lay down a firm foundation for the Citra to shine.

Obviously the recipe is fairly basic.  The idea was to mash fairly low so the beer dries out and the tropical flavors of the Citra hops can flourish, but still mash high enough to have some dextrins left over to balance the bitterness that a high Alpha Acid hop like Citra will impart. Yeast wise, I was lazy, I did not feel like making a starter, so I went with US-05.  Any even more so, I didn't feel like rehydrating on brew day.  We'll see how that decision came back to bite me...

MO' Citra SMASH!

Batch Size: 5 gallons
OG: 1.055
FG: 1.011
SRM: 5.8
IBU: 45

Grain:
10 lbs. Maris Otter

Hops:
0.50 oz. Citra (Pellet, 14.1% AA) @ 60 min
1.00 oz Citra (Pellet, 14.1% AA) @ 10 min
2.00 oz Citra (Pellet, 14.1% AA) @ 0 min (50 minute hop stand)
1.00 oz Citra (Pellet, 13.7% AA) Dry Hop 10 days


Yeast:
Safale US-05

Misc.:
Whirlfloc @ 15 min
Yeast Nutrient @ 15 min

Mash:
Sacch. Rest @ 151F for 60 min

Water:
Carbon filtered DC tap water cut with 4 gallons distilled with 8.5g gypsum and 4g CaCl split evenly between the mash and sparge

Notes:
Brewed 1 March 2013, by myself.

Planned on mashing at 153, ended up being 151.
Collected 6.25 gallons of a 1.044 runnings
Shook for a minute or so to aerate.
Chilled to 65F, left at 62F ambient to ferment.

~24 hours later, active fermentation

3/6/2013 - Increased the temperature to 65 ambient to ensure fermentation completes.

3/8/2013 - Down to 1.011, noticeable diacetyl.  Turned off temperature control (about 68 ambient) to do a diacetyl rest of sorts.

3/13/2013 - Still diacetyl.  Will leave this at ambient temp for a little longer.

3/15/2013 - Needed the fermenter so I racked it to secondary. Made a 750ml starter out of US-05.  Will pitch later to try to add some active yeast to clean up the diacetyl.

3/26/2013 - Still diacetyl. added 1000ml of 1.040 wort to hopefully get the yeast going again.

3/29/2013 - Diacetyl seems to be fading but still noticeable. Added only 1 oz. of Citra to dry hop. I don't want to waste hops on a flawed beer. It seems that not hydrating the dry yeast and perhaps not oxygenating enough didn't give the yeast enough oomph to clean up the diacetyl.

4/5/2013 - Crashed to 36F.

4/7/2013 - Kegged into a double flushed with CO2 keg.

4/14/2013 - Tasting notes:
Appearance: Deep yellow, medium haze, medium head dissipates fairly quickly.

Smell:  Mild Citra nose: tropical, mango, sweet bready malt, but to me the buttery diacetyl dominates. If this beer wasn't flawed I would have dry hopped much more.

Taste: Bread malt to tropical mango notes. Low bitterness (due to waiting for the diacetyl to clear), toasty microwave popcorn...

Mouthfeel: Dry, nice body. Medium, medium low carbonation, lingering butter feeling.

Notes: Diacetyl pretty much dominates everythng.  Moreso in mouthfeel.  However, other friends and homebrew club members did not pick up on the diacetyl until I brought it up.  Well received by others, and I would have dry hopped much more if I didn't think it was flawed.