My last several brews have all been variations on hop explosions and I have kind of burned myself out on hops for a while, which is why I had a dream recently of brewing a beer that would be like an Oktoberfest style beer (malty, with a beautiful brown color, and easily drinkable), but would be an ale (because brewing lagers is pain in the ass without a fridge to ferment in). So I started tinkering and settled on a recipe that looks to be rather alt-like, which led me to start doing research on altbiers during which I found this graph.


As you can see, peak AROMA is about 7 minutes after the start of the boil.<br /> Peak FLAVOR is about 20 minutes into the boil and peak BITTERNESS is arrived at about 60 minutes.


I don't know where Mr Brewsupplies got his numbers from, but I love graphs and this quantifies making hop additions in a way that just tickles me pink.