Recipes only provide a guide. More experienced mixers will often know, just by looking at a recipe, whether it suits their palate or not. I know many mixers who only take the recipe as a template and then tweak it. For example, Jenn Jarvis is a super-taster so her recipes are exceptionally lightly flavoured. Many mixers automatically double her percentages to get a juice that is closer to their palate. Things like sweetener are also palate-specific. Wayne likes a lot of sweetener, I don't. So I'll usually reduce the amount of sweetener in his recipes.
If you want to add more, I would mix up the recipe as is first. If the flavour balance is wrong, adjust to taste. But at least try the original first. What you also need to remember is that many concentrates have off-notes or attributes which only become apparent at a particular percentage. The recipe creator may have pushed the flavour as far as possible already. If you up the percentage without knowing the flavour, you could make it perfumey/bitter/cloying/floral/chalky. Increasing the percentage doesn't just increase the flavour strength. It can change the flavour and how it interacts with other flavours dramatically.
You can test the juice straight after mixing to see how it is. But then I'd give it a proper steep. You can also taste at various points during the steep. So if it calls for a two-week steep, you can taste it fresh, after 3 days, after one week, after ten days, and then again at two weeks. This will give you a good idea how it changes as it steeps.
Upping all the flavours by 1% might actually result in you getting less flavour from the juice. A large number of flavours mute other flavours. If a recipe calls for 0.25% Ethyl Maltol and you increase to 1.25%, you will wonder where all your flavour suddenly went. Rather look at it as a ratio thing. Increasing Strawberry Ripe from 6% to 7% is a lot different from increasing Flv Rich Cinnamon from 0.1% to 1.1%. One is increasing the flavour ratio by about 16%, the other by about 1000%. So rather increase proportionally, like increasing each flavour by 10% or 20% of what it was. So increase a flavour from 5% to 6%, but only increase a 1% flavour to 1.2%. That way, you're increasing the flavour components proportionately.
If you want to add more, I would mix up the recipe as is first. If the flavour balance is wrong, adjust to taste. But at least try the original first. What you also need to remember is that many concentrates have off-notes or attributes which only become apparent at a particular percentage. The recipe creator may have pushed the flavour as far as possible already. If you up the percentage without knowing the flavour, you could make it perfumey/bitter/cloying/floral/chalky. Increasing the percentage doesn't just increase the flavour strength. It can change the flavour and how it interacts with other flavours dramatically.
You can test the juice straight after mixing to see how it is. But then I'd give it a proper steep. You can also taste at various points during the steep. So if it calls for a two-week steep, you can taste it fresh, after 3 days, after one week, after ten days, and then again at two weeks. This will give you a good idea how it changes as it steeps.
Upping all the flavours by 1% might actually result in you getting less flavour from the juice. A large number of flavours mute other flavours. If a recipe calls for 0.25% Ethyl Maltol and you increase to 1.25%, you will wonder where all your flavour suddenly went. Rather look at it as a ratio thing. Increasing Strawberry Ripe from 6% to 7% is a lot different from increasing Flv Rich Cinnamon from 0.1% to 1.1%. One is increasing the flavour ratio by about 16%, the other by about 1000%. So rather increase proportionally, like increasing each flavour by 10% or 20% of what it was. So increase a flavour from 5% to 6%, but only increase a 1% flavour to 1.2%. That way, you're increasing the flavour components proportionately.
