Recipe ideas for a Pro-Am competition

Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

haberdasher

Well-Known Member
Joined
Jun 16, 2013
Messages
97
Reaction score
16
Location
Fort Worth
I'd love some assistance coming up with something awesome.
I have just entered a homebrew competition at a local brewery. It's an audition for a pro-am of sorts. It will be an onsite brew in their parking lot. Limited to 40 entrants.

Conditions:
Bring your own equipment.
They provide as much milled base 2-row as needed
Bring any specialty grains I want. NOTE: I LOVE RYE
There will be a mill available for me to use onsite
They provide pre-heated water (to shorten brew times)
Must use their yeast (fresh, large pitches)
option 1: 1056/001
option 2: custom blend house saison (expect 90%att)
Must use hops from their stock, including dry-hops:
Columbus
Chinook
US Brewers Gold
Czech Saaz
French Strisselspalt
US Northern Brewer

Key notes:
No style limitations. They also don't care if it's 6% or 12%, I generally like to brew in the 7-8% range, but I'm open.
I'm cool with crazy IBUs. I like the enamel stripped off my teeth.
5G or 10G recipe.
I'd prefer to brew 10G, unless I go above 1.075 or so. I have a 48qt cooler MT
I avg right at 77% brewhouse efficiency
BK will be my keggle

The winner will get to brew the recipe with them @30bbl size. :D
 
What about specialty grains? I assume you can use whatever you want as long as you bring it yourself? This is really a neat idea. Let me see what I can come up with.
 
One thing I've considered is modifying Denny's rye IPA (a perfect recipe), upping the rye slightly, using Strisselspalt in place of the Mt Hood, and then using the 1056 instead of 1450

All those changes to fit inside the parameters of whats available to me (hops and yeast-wise)
 
Tell us a little more about the competition too. Is it going to be judged by BJCP standards? If not, what are popular styles in your area? Is the winner picked by a crowd?
 
Tell us a little more about the competition too. Is it going to be judged by BJCP standards? If not, what are popular styles in your area? Is the winner picked by a crowd?

Not BJCP, judged by the Brewery employees, blind, proctored by someone not at competition.
Best of show basis. (no style categories) 1st, 2nd, 3rd places. prizes are $500+30bbl brew distributed all over town, $300, $200 respectively
 
What are some popular beers at this brewery? What are popular styles in your area in general? I'd forget about what you personally like to brew and drink and start to think like the people that are voting on the beer. How big of a sample are they getting? Are you going to be up against all 40 other brewer slots at once during judging?

So the brewery employees are the judges? Is there anything really lacking in their current beer portfolio?

These kinds of competitions require some much more thought than just brewing the best beer according to guidelines. If they already have a killer American Brown Ale, they won't want to brew one of those, as an example. Also, heavy use of specialty grains might be enough to get a pass because they don't want to spend money getting more stuff to brew your beer.
 
What are some popular beers at this brewery? What are popular styles in your area in general?
They are only 18m old or so, they are most known for what is basically a clone of Oskar Blues G'Knight. DFW is kinda all over the map
I'd forget about what you personally like to brew and drink and start to think like the people that are voting on the beer.
I appreciate the advice, but at the same time, I'd have a hard time brewing something I'm not interested in - that would kind of remove the passion from the hobby that would push me to make something that COULD win. make sense?
How big of a sample are they getting? Are you going to be up against all 40 other brewer slots at once during judging?
unknown
So the brewery employees are the judges? Is there anything really lacking in their current beer portfolio?
yes, the employees.
To be really honest their line needs some filling out. Their OB G'knight clone is stellar (better than the original imo)
They actually don't have an IPA, or a spicy rye-oriented beer...
These kinds of competitions require some much more thought than just brewing the best beer according to guidelines. If they already have a killer American Brown Ale, they won't want to brew one of those, as an example. Also, heavy use of specialty grains might be enough to get a pass because they don't want to spend money getting more stuff to brew your beer.

from the site:
We are forming this competition in a way so that your recipe will be ready to scale up if you win. For that reason, You will be provided as much pre-milled 2-row – we used Great Western Malting. You will provide your own specialty malts and can do whatever you want with those – no limits. If you want to use something besides standard 2-row as a base (wheat, munich, etc.) that’s fine too but you would need to provide yourself. Any standard 2-row needs to be provided by us. You can only use the hops we use and we will provide those. Here’s what we use: Columbus, Chinook, US Brewers Gold, Czech Saaz, French Strisselspalt, and US Northern Brewer. We will send you home with any dry-hops you need. You will be required to use our yeast and we will provide a large fresh pitch to everybody. Your choices are our standard house yeast which is comparable to WLP001 or Wyeast 1056. Or our house saison yeast which is a custom blend. You can expect approx. 90% attenuation from that yeast. You will also be given as much preheated water as necessary. We use City of Fort Worth water which has been filtered with activated carbon and not treated in any other way. Tap water hose hookups, 110v power hookups, and a homebrew style mill will be available for use. Please bring your water hose and extension cords.

The beer you brew here on April 27th will be taken home to ferment and bottle. They are due back at the brewery by Monday, June 16th at 5pm. You can keg, and bottle from keg or bottle condition. More details on how many samples and labeling requirements will be provided the day of the competition. There are no style guidelines. All judging will happen on a “Best of Show” basis. The judging will be conducted “blind” by brewery employees and will be proctored by somebody who was not present at the competition. All judging decisions are final.

Please don’t be afraid to get very creative with your recipes, herb, spice, fruit, vegetable, sugars, etc, etc, etc. are encouraged. Style-bending recipes are encouraged. Big 12% beers are encouraged & 5% session beers are encouraged and everything in-between. We’re really looking for things we haven’t thought of here. Good Luck and we are extremely excited to host you guys.
 
All good info.

So go in to it knowing that you're brewing for the brewery employees. Their guidelines are exceptionally open ended, which is neat, but from a commercially viable standpoint they're probably going to blow off the 15% ABV cucumber, agave and Belgium chocolate oatmeal coffee stout if you get what I'm saying.... :)

Since they're brewery employees, they're not going to be scared of hops. The idea of a session IPA kind of piques my interest and is something I'd think about. Even a session rye-PA kind of thing if that's what you're interested in.

I personally analyze the hell out of every variable I can for things like this, and every competition for that matter, but that's just me. I'm not a huge IPA fan, but if they don't have a good one, I'd think about that too. Or maybe something along the lines of a Janet's Brown (hoppy American Brown ale) or a bigger, west coast American red ale.
 
Do you have to take them up on the two row?

White Saison

2 parts pils to 1 part wheat. shoot for mid 1.060's.

hops can go a few ways. Brewer's gold and Fr. Strisselspalt are similar in aroma and could be used in conjunction. I would bitter with Northern Brewer since that should be a nice more pleasant bitterness. For flavor I would consider brewer's gold and the strisselspalt together. They have similar aromas and could pair well though I've never done this combo.

Or you could run it up the middle using CTZ to bitter and a combo of CTZ and chinook for aroma/flavor. That would be more "traditional" IPA but I wonder how Saison yeast would like that combo. The fruit could offset the spice and earth you'll get from CTZ/Chinook or it could clash completely. I would want to try the other idea first. Or at least bounce it off people here.

First instinct would be to stray from typical IPA hop schedules. 60/20/10 would be my inclination. NB at 60 to 40 ish IBU, decent amount of BG at 20 and then a smaller dose at 10 with a good amount of the strisselspalt as well to bring in the traditional blackcurrant. Basically it's an IPA in name. More bitter than a typical Saison with a bit more body but certainly not an IPA. If it matures the way we want and the black currant comes through it could be nice.

Just spitballing.
 
Do you have to take them up on the two row?

White Saison

2 parts pils to 1 part wheat. shoot for mid 1.060's.

hops can go a few ways. Brewer's gold and Fr. Strisselspalt are similar in aroma and could be used in conjunction. I would bitter with Northern Brewer since that should be a nice more pleasant bitterness. For flavor I would consider brewer's gold and the strisselspalt together. They have similar aromas and could pair well though I've never done this combo.

Or you could run it up the middle using CTZ to bitter and a combo of CTZ and chinook for aroma/flavor. That would be more "traditional" IPA but I wonder how Saison yeast would like that combo. The fruit could offset the spice and earth you'll get from CTZ/Chinook or it could clash completely. I would want to try the other idea first. Or at least bounce it off people here.

First instinct would be to stray from typical IPA hop schedules. 60/20/10 would be my inclination. NB at 60 to 40 ish IBU, decent amount of BG at 20 and then a smaller dose at 10 with a good amount of the strisselspalt as well to bring in the traditional blackcurrant. Basically it's an IPA in name. More bitter than a typical Saison with a bit more body but certainly not an IPA. If it matures the way we want and the black currant comes through it could be nice.

Just spitballing.

Extremely interesting. Prior to that input, here is the recipe I wrote in Beersmith... I actually had a pro brewer recommend that I brew a Belgo IPA and use the Saison yeast instead of the 1056... he was quite enamored of that idea....

Also, can you clarify where the "black currant" you reference came from?

Brewer: Scott
Batch Size: 10.00 gal Style: American IPA ()
Boil Size: 12.57 gal Style Guide: BJCP 2008
Color: 9.5 SRM Equipment: Pot and Cooler (10 Gal/37.8 L) - All Grain
Bitterness: 73.3 IBUs Boil Time: 60 min
Est OG: 1.074 (17.8° P) Mash Profile: Single Infusion, Medium Body, Batch Sparge
Est FG: 1.016 SG (4.1° P) Fermentation: Ale, Two Stage
ABV: 7.6% Taste Rating: 30.0
Ingredients
Amount Name Type #
17.00 gal Dallas, TX Water 1
20.00 g Gypsum (Calcium Sulfate) (Mash 60 min) Misc 2
1 lbs 8.0 oz Caramel/Crystal Malt - 60L (60.0 SRM) Grain 3
1 lbs Barley, Flaked (1.7 SRM) Grain 4
19 lbs Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM) Grain 5
5 lbs Rye Malt (4.7 SRM) Grain 6
3 lbs Vienna Malt (3.5 SRM) Grain 7
2.0 oz Saaz [4.0%] - First Wort Hops 8
2.0 oz Chinook [13.0%] - Boil 60 min Hops 9
1.0 oz Chinook [13.0%] - Boil 30 min Hops 10
2.00 Whirlfloc Tablet (Boil 15 min) Misc 11
2.00 tsp Yeast Nutrient (Boil 10 min) Misc 12
1.0 oz Columbus (Tomahawk) [16.0%] - Boil 5 min Hops 13
6 pkgs American Ale (Wyeast Labs #1056) Yeast 14
1.5 oz Columbus (Tomahawk) [14.0%] - Dry Hop 5 days Hops 15
1.5 oz Chinook [13.0%] - Dry Hop 5 days Hops 16
KEG HOP 1.0 oz Columbus (Tomahawk) [16.0%] - Dry Hop 0 days Hops 17
 
Back
Top