Way, way, way over the top Sam Adams Utopia clone

So, this thread has inspired me. I was wondering about scaling the recipe down to 3 gallons, since 10 is both cost and time prohibitive. I plugged it into Beersmith and scaled the recipe to 3 gallons. Total grain bill is 26.40 lbs, very reasonable. How long should the mash be? If I made a 5 gallon beer (IIPA type) with the 099 and then pitched this 3 gallon batch onto the yeast cake, would that be sufficient to start and then pitch some more 099 down the road? Thanks for the recipe and motivation!

FailureDrill said:

So, this thread has inspired me. I was wondering about scaling the recipe down to 3 gallons, since 10 is both cost and time prohibitive. I plugged it into Beersmith and scaled the recipe to 3 gallons. Total grain bill is 26.40 lbs, very reasonable. How long should the mash be? If I made a 5 gallon beer (IIPA type) with the 099 and then pitched this 3 gallon batch onto the yeast cake, would that be sufficient to start and then pitch some more 099 down the road? Thanks for the recipe and motivation!

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I was looking at that myself. It really frightened me that I'd need a 10 gallon mash tun just to make a Mr. Beer full of this stuff. Though tempted once I get one. Of course, I'm tempted by lots of things, so who knows when I'll ever get to it.

Matt Up North said:

Doesn't six row also have more enzymes so that you might be able to fully convert this beast? Just another thought whether correct or not.

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Absolutely right, Matt. We were very worried about mashing this beast. We were very concerned about getting out enough small sugars that would ferment. We knew we would have plenty of big sugars. So in order to get more attenuation we boosted up the 6 row.

It also worked out in our favor that the extra husk of the six row helped in the sparge. We used two sankes with SS screens on the bottom as our mash tuns and even then barely had room enough to get all the grain in. We used a few pounds of rice hulls in the mash, also. It was a VERY thick mash.



That is one of two mash tuns full to the brim.

PTN

FailureDrill said:

So, this thread has inspired me. I was wondering about scaling the recipe down to 3 gallons, since 10 is both cost and time prohibitive. I plugged it into Beersmith and scaled the recipe to 3 gallons. Total grain bill is 26.40 lbs, very reasonable. How long should the mash be? If I made a 5 gallon beer (IIPA type) with the 099 and then pitched this 3 gallon batch onto the yeast cake, would that be sufficient to start and then pitch some more 099 down the road? Thanks for the recipe and motivation!

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I say go for it. I ALWAYS think it's a good idea to try things you are interested in. Who wants to be 88 years old, wearing a diaper, sitting in a wheelchar thinking, "I wish I had got around to doing XYZ." Go for it. What have you got to lose? $20? $50? Sheet! Worst case scenario you blow a few bucks, have a blast on brew day, learn a few things and drink some beer. And you might end up making a damned fine beer. Sounds like a no-lose day to me.

PTN

You need to mash until you have complete conversion. Use the iodine test to tell when that is but I'd start checking after an hour and a half. I think we mashed for a little over 2 hours but we were futzing around with a kimchee rigged HERMS setup as we went.

PTN

paulthenurse said:

I say go for it. I ALWAYS think it's a good idea to try things you are interested in. Who wants to be 88 years old, wearing a diaper, sitting in a wheelchar thinking, "I wish I had got around to doing XYZ." Go for it. What have you got to lose? $20? $50? Sheet! Worst case scenario you blow a few bucks, have a blast on brew day, learn a few things and drink some beer. And you might end up making a damned fine beer. Sounds like a no-lose day to me.

PTN

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HELL YEAH! That's part of my philosophy! I sure as hell don't want to be sitting around when I hafta wait for someone to wipe my ARSE and try to remember the times I had the opportunity to try something that I had been thinking about doing.

My hats off to ya PTN! I've enjoyed the post and all the imbeded Banter. Keep us posted on the whole affair. BTW you've been SUBSCRIBED!

Banter? Where? None in this thread!

PTN

the_Roqk said:

HELL YEAH! That's part of my philosophy! I sure as hell don't want to be sitting around when I hafta wait for someone to wipe my ARSE and try to remember the times I had the opportunity to try something that I had been thinking about doing.

My hats off to ya PTN! I've enjoyed the post and all the inbreded Banter. Keep us posted on the whole affair. BTW you've been SUBSCRIBED!

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I changed that so that the spelling is is corrected for you. You forgot the R in that word. No worries though.

Pog Mo Thoin, Matt.



PTN

How did that work using the immersion chiller hooked to a pump to maintain the mash temp. This might be a good idea when I get my pump so I don't have to worry about insulating the crap out of my mash tun to keep temps. Did it require you to stir the mash pretty often? What temps were the water you had running through it? Thanks.

Oh, and do you happen to know the quantity and gravity of the first runnings?

Tag

It did t work as well as you woiuld wish, probably due for the most part to having tp haul all my gear o er to Yeagers and set it up there. Not brewing at home can be a wicked pita. You inevitably forget something and are out of your comfort zone. I took one trim to the hardware store that day and was spared a second only because a few guys had traveling hardware stores intheir cars. It's a workable way of doing things if you are set up todoit regularly.

PTN

I just looked at this post for the first time after putting it up. Sorry for all the typos, I typed it on my mobile device and my fingers just can't get the hang of that keyboard.

PTN

No worries, I assumed you were drunk. Have you used that system of "reverse herms" on your own setup and if so, how did it work?

If I scale down the batch from 10 gallons to three, I would assume I would have about 6-7 gallons of wort to have to boil down to 3. Does that sound about right? Also, If I pitched on an Imperial IPA yeast cake with 099, would I need to pitch anymore yeast? Sorry for all the questions, but these gigantic (much bigger than just "big") beers have me fascinated.

I have NO IDEA where you people get the notion that I post after I've been drinking? Where did that come from?

And I can't say if it the reverse HERMS thingumbob would work if I did it at home, that is the only time I've tried it...

OTOH, drinking at home I've tried multiple times, and while I wouldn't recommend calling the White House switchboard while experiencing the clarity of thought that 2/3 of a bottle of vodka brings, I've come up with some of my greatest ideas then. Go for it. What have you got to lose?

PTN

How are things going with this beer? Have you had a bottle/sample in a while?
I'm working on my own big beer. It started at 1.142 and so far has had 3# of sugar added. I haven't really taken and gravity readings lately though. Any tips for finishing it out? Did you add Beano, I can't recall what page it was discussed in?

We did not use the beano. I let Yeager talk me out of that becuse I'd never used it before. I regret not using it. It would have got us that last few points that I wish we had. Not that its bad as it is mind you, I just wish we could have dried it out 2 or 3 more points. Then it wold be perfect. But we stil have many months to go before we bottle so time will tell. We added the Makers Mark soaked chips a good month ago and will be taking a small sample shortly.

PTN

I took Johnny Max's recommendation and added 6 Beano tabs at flameout (though he encouraged adding them to the mash as well). The beer seems to be taking to the sugar really well. I'll likely go with oak for a few months and perhaps some dry hopping at the end. Are you planning to carb it? (I can't recall if this was discussed)

I pulled a small bottle of this to bring to CapeBrewings soiree over the weekend. It's down to 1.026!!!!!! Perfectly clear, dark amber color. It is a little harsher than a month ago, the recent addition of the oak chips has not acclamitized with the beer yet. SWMBO had her first taste of it on Saturday and she said it seemed "disjointed, a collection of nice parts that hasn't come together as a whole." We ran it by a bunch of the guys from SSBC and they all enjoyed it. I'm still quite happy with it and am certain that the disconnect is just a result of the recent additions and in another few months we'll be golden. THe drop in gravity was definetly a good thing, I wonder if the chip addition had anything to do with that? I can't come up with a reason why adding wood chips would kickstart a semidormant yeast but that's the only thing that has changed. Perhaps the yeast were still slowly doing their thing and the recent hot weather has just allowed them to finish up. Who knows? In any case, it is still a tremendous beer and I expect it will only improve with age.

PTN

paulthenurse said:

I have NO IDEA where you people get the notion that I post after I've been drinking? Where did that come from?

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The number of signatures you end up in is a dead giveaway.

Exciting to hear the gravity on this thing is still coming down. 1.026 is GREAT...

I think with my sugar addition today, I've reached above 1.200 theoretical OG. I'm going to take a sample here in a little while to see what's happening, but it looks quite happy. Recipe is on my blog, linked below.
Looks like it's at 1.067, and still quite happily fermenting. ABV is calculated to around 18%+. The flavor is just incredible. I had a bottle of World Wide Stout a few nights ago and it's certainly something along those lines. The 100+ IBUs are definitely peeking through. I'm pretty pysched to see how it turns out.

Update

This stuff is GREAT!!! I have tried it a few times in the past week, and it gets better every time I dip my tongue in it. Part of that is probably due to some oxidation as it sits in a half full bottle. I think it needs a touch more in the way of hop bitterness, but that's just nitpicking. I'm really excited to make this again, it really came out great. Yeager and I will be doing it again after Christmas, he already started a thread on it here.

I sent a couple of bottles to the HBT competition with instructions to open the bottles an hour before judging, I think that the oxydation helps. I'm really looking forward to getting independant critiques.

PTN

This thread is so f'in epic I re-read the whole *&@% thing yesterday. By the time I was done I had to change my underwear.

I'm gonna have to brew something similar myself. Probably will use more % sugar and more hops to dry it out a bit more and balance it.

You are a sick lad, Sacc. A sick, twisted lad.

Yeager and I have decided to bottle in October. We're going to use 375 ml clear, frosted hock bottles. That should look pretty cool. The bottles are on order and I'll certainly post pics when they get filled.

PTN

I sent some of this brew into the recent HBT BJCP competition. Since a lot of you guys followed this thread and may be planning on someday making a beer like this yourselves, I've decided to open up my scoresheets so that we can all learn something.


Here goes. I've copied the scoresheets exactly as written with the exception of withholding the names of the judges.


Subcatagory: Specialty
Special Ingrediants: Utopias Clone
Entry #1038


Judge #1
Qualifications: Professional Brewer
BJCP Rank: Certified


Aroma: Intense malt aroma. Notes of dried and stone fruit. Alcohol evident in nose. 8/12

Appearance: Ruby - Garnet. Brilliantly clear. 3/3

Flavor: Malt for days with notes of vanilla and aged leather. Hop bitterness & flavor well balanced. Alcohol evident but not unpleasant. Complex mead-like flaovors. 14/20

Mouthfeel: Intense alcohol warming. Med - full mouthfeel. 3/5

Overall Impression: Good effort at one of the most amazing beers. I've drank quite a bit of the original. You've made a good run at it but need more complex layered flavors & a little less burn.

Total: 37/50





Judge # 2
Qualifications: Professional Brewer
BJCP Rank: Recognized

Aroma: Big plums - Bread - Raisins - Malt - Dark Cherries - Vanilla - Toasted Marshmellows 9/12

Appearance: Brilliantly Clear - Brown Color with Ruby Highlights 2/3

Flavor: Oaky - Toasted Marshmellow - Bread - Malty - Warming - Big Malt Complexity 16/20

Mouthfeel: Meduim Body with very low carb. Very Dry finish. Leaves mouth needing moisture. 3/5

Overall Impression: As far as being a clone of the SA Utopias - I think it falls a touch short, but that beer is more like a brandy - This is more like a Big Barley Wine that has been spiked with high octane alcohol. 8/10

Total: 38/50

Stylistic Accuracy: 4/5

Technical Merit: 4/5

Intangables: 4/5


Well, there it is. All in all I'm pleased. I think we did pretty damned good considering the time frame, we only brewed this in January and the original is held for years before being released. I think that certainly acounts for all of the comments about the prominant alcohol. In another year or two that will be much better integrated and less 'in your face.'

Other than that I don't see any glaring problems. Is it the original? No. Is it close? It seems so. Is it a damned good beer? Bet your ass.

PTN

paulthenurse said:

spiked with high octane alcohol

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I'm LOLing over this one...

a little less burn

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... and when I saw that I thought he had read this thread. Then I realized, maybe not.

I had a giggle over that one myself.

PTN

WTF... Why all excited Paul? I told you two months ago it didn't suck. You need more than that?

Jeeez... talk about needy.

"yes Paul, you made a decent beer... now here's you're pat on the head. Go play now."

You showin' up at the meeting tonight? You can take your goofy hat back, with the big feather in it.

Nope, working.

What hat?

That beige LL Bean hat you wore that day diving... with the big feather in it.... you know, the one that makes you look really fruity? That one. You left it in my truck that day and I've had it ever since.

So THAT's where that went! I was looking for that at last months Gay Pride Parade, thought I'd lost it!

PTN

can wait to see the scores in a few years. The complexity should be there by then

Here's three additional ways to up the ABV if your inclined:
1. Add 1 drop olive oil + apple juice to starter for high gravity brews: http://www.babblebelt.com/newboard/thread.html?tid=1108752780&th=1180990051&pg=1&tpg=1
2. Barrel age with a humidity<65% to increase ABV: http://www.extension.iastate.edu/Wine/Resources/oakagingofredwine.htm
3. Ice it to remove water.
I wonder how high you can go?

The Utopia is bottled. Here she be.



Mmmmmmmmm. Yummy.

PTN

Interesting. I assume the wax is an extra measure to prevent oxidation over the long period that you plan on storing this? Or just cause it looks cool!

... if he doesn't use wax he'll get cuts from the caps... and then he won't be able to sit for a few days.

We corked the bottles so you are correct, it was to help seal them for longer term storage. And cause it looks cool.

The wax's lubricating properties are an unexpected but appreciated extra.

PTN

Jesus christ you cretons...on topic, on topic. Wait a sec...later PTN will be on topic and the wax will help. Nevermind

So... a year later.. how is the experiment going?

So this is served uncarbed?

conpewter said:

So this is served uncarbed?

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Was wondering the same thing myself. No counter pressure filling of even a little spritz?