37.4 vs 44.4 ibu's Much of a difference?

[badgerdan]

I've got a recipe and in beersmith the ibu's come out as 37.4 (boil times and hop aa's are shown)
When i add the hops i have with their different aplha acids the final ibu's are 44.4

So, as I've never redone a recipe straight after another i have no idea how much of a difference in taste this is going to be. Should i leave it as is or adjust my hop amount to get to the original?

Cheers

[6470zzy]

Quite honestly I don't think that you will be able to tell the difference. Not to worry

[vacant]

Unless the last recipe was your final verdict on the perfect beer, I suggest increasing the difference from the previous recipe so you can compare and work out what you prefer.

[bigchris]

I'm with Vacant, you probably won't notice the difference so should try to increase the difference a bit more and see if the beer is better or worse.

[gibbiem]

What is an IBU and how many does Fosters Gold have?

[RdeV]

I don't understand, would you not be adjusting the amount of hops to account for your particular hops' AA%? Formulating it that way with your particular hops should have it coming in exactly where the recipe wanted it for IBU, while most recipators are quite good at exactly this application.

[Jim]

Reading some recent threads on utilisation and alpha acid levels, I doubt if you even know how many IBUs you're putting in to that level of accuracy.

[timbo41]

With Jim on this. Been thinking lately, if you were a farmers wife making beer two hundred years back, you weren't bothered with hop utilization and I.b.u
It was handful of this,Peck of that.
Intuitive in a way. Bit random perhaps, but much more fun!!

[Cpt.Frederickson]

Reading some recent threads on utilisation and alpha acid levels, I doubt if you even know how many IBUs you're putting in to that level of accuracy.

Quite right, I used to agonise over this stuff. Brewmate would say one thing, Beersmith another...it was all very confusing. I read up on Rager, Tinseth etc and the differences in the calculations. Then I looked at Beersmith's hop aging tool...talk about muddying the water!
Now I take the view of guesstimate. Have an idea of roughly where you want your bittering and go with that. Don't agonise over a few IBUs like I did! Save yourself!

[RdeV]

Oh yes, rightly so apropos discriminating smallish changes in IBU, rather I was more concerned the OP wasn't utilizing the BS application's core functionality.

[mojonojo]

if you were a farmers wife making beer two hundred years back, you weren't bothered with hop utilization and I.b.u
It was handful of this,Peck of that. Intuitive in a way. Bit random perhaps, but much more fun!!

Except beer has been a well recorded industrialised process for the last 400 years with precise recordings of what was used and when, allowing people like Ron Pattinson to go back and look at the archives - http://barclayperkins.blogspot.co.uk/ and re-create lost beers.