Steelhead Slammer Double IPA

My friend Jesse has been a long time fan of my beers. It's always nice to have friends who are both supportive and also very honest critics of your creations. Earlier this summer Jesse asked me to brew a beer for him, specifically a double IPA. Jesse is a fan of all things hoppy, and in particular enjoys double or imperial IPAs. Similar to my obsession with brewing, Jesse's main hobby is fishing. He's a big fly fisherman, and wanted the IIPA to take on a fishing trip to the shores of Lake Superior fishing for Steelhead salmon. He gave me plenty of time, calling me in June and wanting the beer by the end of September/early October. In preparation, I brewed several hoppy beers this summer and consulted a number of sources to figure out a way to brew a hoppy monster. After several conversations we settled on the name,he approved the label, and I finally settled on a recipe.
This summer I've been brewing extract beers to compensate for the lack of time I have with a 2 month old and a 2 year old. I've actually been having a lot of fun brewing extract beers, and have a routine down that allows me to fit in brewing at night. I've brewed much more often then I had thought I would. I plan on slowing the brewing down once school starts, and limiting my brewing to once a month. As a result, I think I will be going back to brewing partial mash recipes, which I do enjoy more. Steelhead Slammer is an extract recipe, using 9 lbs malt extract and some cane sugar.
This is the hoppiest beer brewed in the Bearded Brewery. It should be around 70 Ibu's. I used 1 ounce of Chinhook hops and .35 ounces of American Summit (13% AA) for bittering, and then I used 2 ounces of Centennial, an ounce of Cascade and .65 ounces of American Summit in the final 15 minutes. It smelled fantastic and it was already active this morning, so I'm hoping it will finish quickly and cleanly. I am going to use 2 ounces of cascade whole hops for dry hopping. Pretty excited to see how it turns out, and talking to Jesse he's pumped to drink the end result as well.

On another note, my Orange Beard Mango IPA is tasting great after a week in the bottle, so I have high hopes for this, and it will most likely turn into a 5 gallon batch in the near future.
I will also post soon about my annual fantasy draft beer, this year's version is a hefeweizen.
Salud!
Bearded Brewer