Ommegang Art of Darness clone?

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DarkBrood

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Anyone out there take a stab at a recipe for a clone of Ommegang's limited edition Art of Darkness yet? Had a bottle a few weeks ago and it just about took me to my knees....
 
Can't help you, but that's good to hear. I bought a bottle on a whim and it's hiding in the back of my fridge. How'd it compare to some other solid BDSAs (ex. Rochefort 10)?
 
It's been long enough since I've had anything this dark with a Belgian taste that I can't really compare directly. It was black as night, roasty without being stout-ish, and rolled over the tongue like fresh-melted chocolate infused with nitrogen - all with hints of all the classic spice-and-fruit notes from Ommegang's Belgian yeast throughout.... It's not often I'll crow over a brew like this, but Art of Darkness truly is a work of art!
 
Anyone out there take a stab at a recipe for a clone of Ommegang's limited edition Art of Darkness yet? Had a bottle a few weeks ago and it just about took me to my knees....

visited the brewery while it was in tanks labeled "AOD" and was really excited to try it
although when i did i was very dissapointed, almost astringent and missed most of the "belgian" aspect of it i was looking for.
Ive found that bombers i have from ommegang are 10 times smoother after sitting in the celler even for a month or so

Guess i gotta give it another try!!
 
I spoke with the master brewer via one email, that's the only response I was able to get out of him. He tole me to try to harvest the yeast from one of the bottles I have left. I did it about 10 days ago and I now have a very large supply of Ommegang AOD yeast. I am planning to put them in vials to save and make a few attempts at this brew. From what he said, the yeast makes the difference. I am really disappointed it is a limited edition, I cant find anymore bottles.

I am going to make my first attempt on Sunday and would really like some input on what you think I should try for a grain bill. All it says on the bottle is barley and wheat malts with flaked oats.
 
I just found this online, hopefully it is correct. I am going to put something together.

"Malts: Pils, pale, cara crystal, aroma, Midnight Wheat, Cara Pils, flaked oats. Hops: Spalter Select and Styrian Golding. Yeast: Ommegang house yeast. Spices: None"

Hopefully this yeast holds up, its been fun trying to harvest from the bottle.
 
I had noticed comments about AoD using the Ommegang house yeast, and from what I've been able to find out, it sounds like they use just the one for all their brews (except perhaps for collaborations). I've been having a hard time finding another bottle of AoD as well - but given the general yeast-reuse recommendations (light batches to darker/flavorful/hoppy batches), might some yeast harvested from Rare Vos or their Wit be a better choice to get the full flavor impact of their yeast?
 
Would it make a differance between the beers because it is a different beer type, if it is the same yeast in each bottle type? I understand you could have off effects from the initial harvested yeast because they may not be clean but you have to add and take away several servings of 'wort' to actually get a large enough sample of yeast. Wouldn't that clean any after effects off of the yeast that may have been left from the beer it was brewed in?

The brewer I spoke with told me to use midnight wheat to harvest the yeast from the bottle so I steeped the midnight wheat grains and added DME to each feeding.

I got quite a bit of yeast from the AoD so hopefully it works well with the grain bill I had put together.

I found a bar nearby that is still selling bottles of AoD for 21 bucks. (6 bucks higher than whole foods had it). Maybe check the bars nearby for it.

Ive got all my grains put together and will be brewing this tomorrow. I also grabbed 15 large vials to store the leftover yeast in so hopefully I can preserve some.
 
The brew last night went great and my bottle harvested yeast started bubbling. If this clone comes out close to AoD I will post it up for you guys.
 
SnowBird said:
The brew last night went great and my bottle harvested yeast started bubbling. If this clone comes out close to AoD I will post it up for you guys.

How did this turn out?
 
Resurrecting this.

Just had this and didn't think to look for a clone until after u had rinsed the bottle. Guess I should have tried harvesting the yeast.

Got the bottle in a gift lack for Christmas. Would drink daily for the rest of my life.

Any suggestions on recipe or suitable off the shelf yeasts?!
 
So this guy built the recipe below - probably largely based on the information on the web that has been posted in this thread as well.

I (of course) failed to harvest the yeast from my AoD bottle - but from what I understand they use the same strain for most of their beers - and that I can either culture it from another bottle or three or get the Northeastern Abbey yeast from The Yeast Bay (anyone care to confirm that this is Ommegang and not actually Allagash? He's very vague about its origin...)

Anyway, the recipe below. I'm wondering if its a bit aggressive on specialty malts. From what I've read, Midnight Wheat is supposed to be pretty mellow as far as a roasted malt goes, but the CaraMunich, Flaked Oats, and Carapils and Aromatic all clock in at 6% each of the grain bill, and the Midnight Wheat at 8%. Seems high.

Might have to do a few iterations on this.



https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=376746

Any thoughts or experience would be greatly appreciated. This beer rocks and I'd like to get close so that I can experiment with a few different things. I emailed Ommegang but the responder was unwilling to provide any guidance.

(5.5 gallons to the fermenter)

5.5lb Belgian Pilsner
5.5lb American Pale
3.5lb Midnight Wheat
1.25lb Cara Crystal
12oz Aromatic
12oz CaraPils
8oz Flaked Oats
1.5oz Spalter Select (60 min)
1oz Styrian Goldings (15 min)
Ommegang house yeast
OG = 1.081, IBU = 26
 
That is a very large amount of midnight wheat - I would have a hard time thinking, that at that volume, you wouldn't get quite the roasty kick from it. I would probably scale that back and shoot for an SRM of around 40
 
That is a very large amount of midnight wheat - I would have a hard time thinking, that at that volume, you wouldn't get quite the roasty kick from it. I would probably scale that back and shoot for an SRM of around 40

I presume you're talking about the grain bill I quoted, which calls for 21% Midnight wheat. I've already dine exactly what you proposed and scaled back to ~40 SRM (6-8% ) I'm just wondering about the consequences on the thicker mouthfeel that AoD seemed to actually have, which, I imagine, is why the person I quoted had so much in there.
 
Ah gotcha - maybe I should read the whole post next time! ;)

Malts: Pils, pale, cara crystal, aroma, Midnight Wheat, Cara Pils, flaked oats. Hops: Spalter Select and Styrian Golding. Yeast: Ommegang house yeast. Spices: None
OG: 19.5 Plato
FG: 4.18 Plato
ABV 8.7%
IBU 24
Having had the beer, it did have a pleasantly smooth mouthfeel and it wasn't sticky - I would definitely bump up the oats, and not go too crazy with the cara crystal (could be caramunich, but I'm thinking dingemans cara 20 or 40). I've gotten head retention contribution from as little as 3% carapils... so I would probably start there.

You definitely don't want this beer to get too dry or the midnight wheat's subtle roast character might not be too subtle..it's quite a balancing act.
 
I made what was supposed to be a Stone Vertical Epic 06 clone, but used Midnight Wheat instead of Dark malt and the roast is very subtle but there in the recipe below and I used Debittered Black Malt as well. This is using double what I used and I don't pick up the roast in Art of Darkness so would likely go down to maybe .75lb in this.

2-Row 14.8lbs
Midnight Wheat 1.17lbs
Dingemanns Debittered Black Malt .85lbs
White Wheat .1lb
 
So your recipe there has it at 7%, 0.75lbs would be 4.5%... I think I will keep in for about 6%.

This is what my first attempt currently looks like, might get tweaked before I brew it. Going to build up a starter next week, need to order ingredients as well. Probably going to get enough to do a few iterations.

View attachment 1455811819801.jpg
 
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