Samuel Adams Old Fezziwig Ale clone

I found this minimash recipe for SA old fezz. Any thoughts on this other then it's way to late to do it for this year?

6.5lb Dark Malt Extract
2.0lb Dry Dark Malt Extract (DME)
3lb Clover Honey

Grains
.5lb Chocolate Malt
.5lb Crystal Malt (80-L)
.5lb Black Patent Malt

2oz Northern Brewer Hops (Bittering)
1oz Cascade Hops (Aroma)
1oz Ginger, Grated

3 Oranges, Peeled and Quartered
3 Cinnamon Sticks
2 Whole Nutmegs
6 Whole Cloves
1/4 Teaspoon Irish Moss
1 Vial White Labs Irish Ale Yeast (WLP004)
_________________________
Here are the instructions:

Place the crushed Crystal Malt, Chocolate Malt, and Black Patent Malt in the water and steep at 70°C for 30 minutes. Remove the spent grains then add the Dry Dark malt Extract, Honey and Northern Brewer Hops, and boil for ½ hour. Add the Cascade Hops and Irish Moss during the last 5 minutes of the boil. Turn off heat and add the oranges and spices. Allow to steep for 30 minutes, then strain. Cool the work and pitch the yeast. Allow to primary ferment for 10 to 14 days and then transfer to secondary fermenter. Ferment for an aditional 7 to 10 days then bottle. Age in the bottle for at least 10 days before drinking.
______________________________
A 1/2 hour boil? Seep oranges peeled and quartered? Does this seem stupid?

I just saw this extract kit on AHS, does this sound similar to the SA fezziwig or am I nuts?

http://www.austinhomebrew.com/product_info.php?cPath=178_452_609&products_id=12372

Did someone actually make this- how did it turn out? I would like to do this for next Christmas. Please post and let us know

Second that notion. Let us know!

stevesquires said:

Did someone actually make this- how did it turn out? I would like to do this for next Christmas. Please post and let us know

Click to expand...

I never made it, I made a LHBS kit for a Christmas beer. It came down to money meaning I didn't have enough to make the Fezzi wig....

Made this exact recipe several years ago except the boil was 1 hour and the spices were put in at the 30 minute mark. Oranges were still steeped at end of boil though. Only other difference was use of Wyeast 1084 Irish rather than White Labs. On the surface, the recipe seems to match the profile of Sam Adams Old Fezziwig (at least the spices) but the fermentables throw the ABV way past Old Fezzi's 5.9%. My batch's OG was 1.074 and FG was 1.020 (basement got too cold and yeasties settled out before reaching target FG of 1.016). Even with a short FG, my ABV was 7.1% or about 20% higher than Sam Adams'. If target FG would have been hit, ABV would have been 7.6% or about 30% higher. End result was it was more characteristic of an Old Ale rather than a Holiday Ale and the strength of brew overpowered the spices. That being said, I'm giving it another shot tomorrow but will back off on the fermentables (probably only use 1 or 2 #'s of honey).

I made this exact recipe two years ago and it was phenomenal. Nice and dark, highly alcoholic and highly spiced. A perfect give-away Christmas beer.

I'd rather see an all-grain version though ...

Just brewed this yesterday as a 10-gallon extract batch, and kind of a mish-mosh of the recipes above:

12.3 lb Dark Malt Extract
4.0lb Dry Dark Malt Extract (DME)
3lb Clover Honey instead of the 6 in the original recipe

Grains
1lb Chocolate Malt
1lb Crystal Malt (80-L)
1lb Black Patent Malt

4oz Northern Brewer Hops (Bittering)
2oz Cascade Hops (Aroma)

6 Oranges, Peeled and Quartered
6 Cinnamon Sticks
4 Whole Nutmegs
12 Whole Cloves
2 tablets whirlfloc
2 Wyeast Irish Ale 1084

I FORGOT THE GINGER!!!

Boiled for an hour, with the oranges and seasonings put in for the last half hour, then kept them in to steep for 1/2 hour after the boil was done. Took the oranges out and a few of the nutmegs after the half hour, but left the cinnamon sticks and a couple nutmegs in until the beer was transferred to the primary since they were on the bottom of the brew kettle.

OG is 1.071, so looks like it may be heading in the direction lauxri's brew went ABV-wise.

Any suggestions about adding ginger now or should I just leave it as-is?

Thanks,

Mike

I'd leave it as is. Ginger is a natural ingredient that can vary in intensity. Without the mellowing that the post-boil provides, it would be easy for it to dominate your brew,

I've been meaning to post an update to the post above so thanks Themats for giving a reminder. First things first - agree with notsane that it will be tough to tune the Ginger at this point. For what it's worth I didn't pick-up a distinguishable Ginger taste or aroma either time I built the recipe - more Cinnamon than anything - but it might have been too subtle to pick-up. However, one option might be to make a Ginger tea and add it at bottling. Boil up the Ginger in a couple cups of H2O and cool. Then add some to bottling bucket, stir, taste, add some more, stir, taste, etc. Risks are sanitation, oxidation through stirring and too much aroma from Ginger that would have flashed off during wort boil. But if it feels like something is missing might be worth a shot.

As far as my second attempt at the recipe, I did it exactly the same as last time but dropped out 2 #'s of honey. Also did some tuning at bottling with Cinnamon and Nutmeg teas using same process as described above. End result was it had almost the exact same taste and profile as Old Fezzi. After bottling I literally couldn't tell the difference between the homebrew and the Sam Adams original.

Bottom line - From my two feeble attempts it looks like matching the recipe exactly you get a tasty but highly alcoholic Old Ale or Winter Warmer. Dropping out some of the fermentables - in my case the honey - gave me something that matched Old Fezzi pretty darn close w/o the bite of the full recipe version. JMHO but both were worth the effort. Can't wait to tap open up the couple of the six packs I reserved from last year to see if aging has made any difference.

I like the tea idea, especially since you didn't get an overpowering taste from it. I confess that my big worry was what notsane described: too much intensity. I've got 10 gallons to work with, so I may try 2 different strengths of ginger "tea", one for each bottling bucket. Thanks for adding the suggestion lauxri.

FWIW, I made a mini-mash of the AHS recipe referenced by Firstnten several weeks ago. I'll keg it this weekend and tap it around Thanksgiving. I'll let everyone know how similar it is to the Sam Adams. It wont be dead on b/c the profile doesn't match, but it should be w/in the ballpark.

Great stuff in this thread guys! I know it's pushing it (holiday-wise), but I love this beer so much I'm going to brew this next weekend! 10 gallon batch in my keggle.

Thanks for the updates guys, keep'em comin!

I kegged the AHS Chocolate Orange a couple of weeks ago. Its on CO2 right now. First off a caveat: It did not ferment fully. The ABV is way too low in the 3.9 - 4.0 range. It just never took off and I didnt feel like chasing it to try to fix it. Having said that its not a bad beer. I dont taste the orange in it at all. Its a bit thin tasting. More bitter than I expected. Not nearly as smooth as an Old Fez but its not a bad beer. It definitely is one that will improve with age. I tried one a few days after kegging and it wasnt good at all. Now that its got good carbonation its OK. Because of the bite, I'm going to move it over to my Stout faucet under Beergas as soon as a Samuel Smith Oatmeal Stout clone I have is drained. I think this one will be much better served under Nitro.

I think I'm going to try this one again at some point and use an extra yeast pack or do a starter. I'll also double up on the flavor packet.

I posted this as my comments on the beer on the AHS site. In retrospect, I think my OG reading was wrong because the beer has no indication of being that out of "whack". If you really are trying to duplicate Old Fezziwig, this AHS beer is not the one you want. Keep searching for an actual clone recipe.


I did the partial mash of this. My OG was off, but in retrospect I think it may have been a measurement error bc the final came in as expected and the taste isnt "off" at all. Its definitely a deeper flavor than I had expected. I bought it hoping it would be similar to a Sam Adams Old Fez. Its definitely got a "stout" bite to it. The chocolate is very dry. If you like dark beers with a bit of bitterness/roast flavor to them, you'll enjoy this beer. If you like the Sam Adams Holiday porter or the Saint Arnold Winter stout (or similar), you should also really enjoy this beer.

I originally had it on CO2 but after having a couple of glasses I decided it was more suited to beergas. As a previous poster commented, huge head retention on it. I had to warm it up to purge enough CO2 to keep from making a Nitro foam fest. On beergas it is a very good beer. I'd like to try again and see if I end up out of whack on the OG again. Next time I'll go full blown all grain though.

One caveat - if you use an autosiphon, the orange in the spice pack tends to clog while you're transferring to secondary or to bottling/kegging, so keep a spray bottle of starsan with you while you transfer it to avoid contamination b/c you'll be pulling the siphon tube out to clean it regularly.

Firstnten said:

I found this minimash recipe for SA old fezz. Any thoughts on this other then it's way to late to do it for this year?

6.5lb Dark Malt Extract
2.0lb Dry Dark Malt Extract (DME)
3lb Clover Honey

Grains
.5lb Chocolate Malt
.5lb Crystal Malt (80-L)
.5lb Black Patent Malt

2oz Northern Brewer Hops (Bittering)
1oz Cascade Hops (Aroma)
1oz Ginger, Grated

3 Oranges, Peeled and Quartered
3 Cinnamon Sticks
2 Whole Nutmegs
6 Whole Cloves
1/4 Teaspoon Irish Moss
1 Vial White Labs Irish Ale Yeast (WLP004)
_________________________
Here are the instructions:

Place the crushed Crystal Malt, Chocolate Malt, and Black Patent Malt in the water and steep at 70°C for 30 minutes. Remove the spent grains then add the Dry Dark malt Extract, Honey and Northern Brewer Hops, and boil for ½ hour. Add the Cascade Hops and Irish Moss during the last 5 minutes of the boil. Turn off heat and add the oranges and spices. Allow to steep for 30 minutes, then strain. Cool the work and pitch the yeast. Allow to primary ferment for 10 to 14 days and then transfer to secondary fermenter. Ferment for an aditional 7 to 10 days then bottle. Age in the bottle for at least 10 days before drinking.
______________________________
A 1/2 hour boil? Seep oranges peeled and quartered? Does this seem stupid?

Click to expand...

For anyone who has made this recipe, did you add the liquid extract at the beginning or end of the boil? The recipe doesn't say. Thanks.

I'm going to try a version of this with all spice or coriander instead of cloves and see how it does...I will update...hope all goes well.

How many weeks in primary? any need for a secondary? Bought the ingredients for this today, id love to have it by Christmas...

Also just realized a priming sugar amount isn't listed.

If anyone is curious, these ingredients, minus the oranges and honey cost me around $60 at my LHBS

Firstnten said:

I found this minimash recipe for SA old fezz. Any thoughts on this other then it's way to late to do it for this year?

6.5lb Dark Malt Extract
2.0lb Dry Dark Malt Extract (DME)
3lb Clover Honey

Grains
.5lb Chocolate Malt
.5lb Crystal Malt (80-L)
.5lb Black Patent Malt

2oz Northern Brewer Hops (Bittering)
1oz Cascade Hops (Aroma)
1oz Ginger, Grated

3 Oranges, Peeled and Quartered
3 Cinnamon Sticks
2 Whole Nutmegs
6 Whole Cloves
1/4 Teaspoon Irish Moss
1 Vial White Labs Irish Ale Yeast (WLP004)
_________________________
Here are the instructions:

Place the crushed Crystal Malt, Chocolate Malt, and Black Patent Malt in the water and steep at 70°C for 30 minutes. Remove the spent grains then add the Dry Dark malt Extract, Honey and Northern Brewer Hops, and boil for ½ hour. Add the Cascade Hops and Irish Moss during the last 5 minutes of the boil. Turn off heat and add the oranges and spices. Allow to steep for 30 minutes, then strain. Cool the work and pitch the yeast. Allow to primary ferment for 10 to 14 days and then transfer to secondary fermenter. Ferment for an aditional 7 to 10 days then bottle. Age in the bottle for at least 10 days before drinking.
______________________________
A 1/2 hour boil? Seep oranges peeled and quartered? Does this seem stupid?

Click to expand...

Maybe I'm nuts, but is this for a 5 gal batch or 10? Just seems like a lot of material...