Hill Famstead Abner Clone

Found this recipe and thought I would share. Abner is one of my favorite double ipa.

Batch: all-grain
Size: 5.5 gallons/21L
OG: 1.077
FG: 1.014
IBU: 100+
SRM: 7
ABV: 8%

Ingredients
15lbs 2-row pale malt
.75lbs caramalt (37L)
1lb corn sugar
1oz Warrior hop @60min
.75oz Columbus @30min
1oz simcoe @knockout/whirlpool
1oz centennial @knockout/whirlpool
.5oz Chinook @knockout/whirlpool
3oz Simcoe dry hop (day 7 for 7-10 days
2oz Chinook dry hop (day 7 for 7-10 days)
1 Tb Polycar
Yeast: Wyeast 1028, white labs WLP013 or Lallemand Nottingham

It's a single infusion mash. Target mash temp is 149 degrees. Hold for 45 minutes, then mash out or begin lautering phase. Collect 7 gallons in boil kettle and boil for 75 minutes adding hops as instructed. After boil is done, create a whirlpool and add the knockout hops and let rest for 30 minutes before chilling. Target pitching rate is 1 million cells. Ferment at 68 degrees for 7 days. After 7 days add Polycar or fining agent to clear yeast from the beer. Then add the dry hops for 7-10 days. Some tips to getting this beer right are: using a hop spider or a muslin bag to collect as much hop material as possible especially when using whole hops. Try to have chloride and sulfate levels in your brewing water around 50 ppm.

Is this one of the BYO clones from the October issue?

Sure was. Trying it out Sunday!

Nice! Let us know how it goes.

Will do. I wanted to try this out with conan but I am going with the Wyeast London ale. In going to get abner from HF to do a side by side

dry hop in primary or go to 2ndry?

Doesn't specify, I'll be doing it in primary. Brewed this on Sunday and was way off for OG and total fermenting wort. I messed up somewhere obviously but I'm going to give the recipe another shot soon!

When do you add the corn sugar? Last 5 min of the boil? Also, would Carapils be a good sub for Caramalt or should I be looking at blending some crystal?

Corn sugar at last 10 minutes of boil. Caramalt is usually around 37L so your best bet may be to blend crystal.

Hops and yeast (WLP013) have been ordered... I'm brewing this soon! I do not have access to Polyclar though. I'll use Irish Moss and Whirlfloc instead.

Abner is one of the best beer I've ever had!

Agreed. I'm fortunate to live so close to the brewery.

So just added Polycar and dry hopped. Finished low at 1.012 but my OG was low as well 1.066. Clocked in a little over 7% tastes very similar already. We will see what it tastes like in a week!

Let me know how it turns out. I'm an hour from Greensboro Bend. Try to stop now and again.

I'm also about an hour away (Cambridge) stopped up yesterday and got a growler of abner to compare. Just kegged today and will do a side by side and soon as it's carbed!

What was the point of the 30 minutes before cooling? Not something I have heard of in a recipe before. Always though you wanted to cool as quickly as possible.

MrNickVT said:

I'm also about an hour away (Cambridge) stopped up yesterday and got a growler of abner to compare. Just kegged today and will do a side by side and soon as it's carbed!

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Can't wait to see how this turns out.

bluemoose said:

What was the point of the 30 minutes before cooling? Not something I have heard of in a recipe before. Always though you wanted to cool as quickly as possible.

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You whirlpool at flame out and add hops also called a hop stand. You lets those hops rest for 30 minutes before cooling. The byo magazine wasn't very detailed by any means. I'm sure there's specific temps for hop stands for different effects from the hops. But the recipe didn't specify.

Did you make any water adjustments? This is on my list of beers to brew.

PJM said:

Did you make any water adjustments? This is on my list of beers to brew.

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I did not. Was really hung-over when I brewed this. I made a bunch of mistakes. Next time I will though!

Not as clear or close as I was hoping for. Mine came out darker and more bitter at the end.

MrNickVT said:

Not as clear or close as I was hoping for. Mine came out darker and more bitter at the end.View attachment 175695

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It might be hard to tell, but do you think that is mostly from recipe error, or some mistakes during brewing? Any suggestions on what you would change?

Thanks for the update MrNickVT!

I'm brewing it this sunday. What would you change to the original recipe?

I'm going to brew again. I do believe that the errors played a big part. So as of now I would keep everything the same. The one thing I have noticed is that Abner is 8.7 vs the 8 abv the recipe says. But like I said I'll have to give this another shot. There were some familiar tastes and scents between the two. So I believe the recipe is pretty close.

Right on, Nick. Thanks.

I am brewing my attempt at this tomorrow with a few changes.

I don't have caramalt, but I will sub a mixture of C40 and carapils to get close to the color...probably a 30% c40 70% carapils.

In addition, I am going to double the whirlpool hops and am using an ipa water profile that I have developed over my last few beers.

I've only had Abner once so I don't really have access to compare it, but either way, I am damn sure that this will be one tasty dipa.

MrNickVT said:

Not as clear or close as I was hoping for. Mine came out darker and more bitter at the end.View attachment 175695

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That London ale yeast makes for a foggy beer. It takes a good time to clear, but is good.

Also, with the color,.. maybe HF uses a different caramalt.. Looks like Thomas Fawcett is at 20-27L as opposed to the Simpsons 37L caramalt which byo listed.

Brewed this today and it came in at 1.075.. A few points shy of my 1.077 target.

I went with a ratio of 3/1 sulfate to chloride.

My changes:
Doubled the whirlpool hops, cut the corn sugar down to 1/2 lb, and used American ale yeast instead of London.

Will be a little different than byo's so called " clone", but I am sure it will be good.

Awesome keep us posted how it turns out. I think I may have fermented high. I've noticed an apple scent to it. I'm going to let it hang out in the keg for another week and see if the apple will fade.

so right off the bat, there are several things about that recipe that don't look right. 7 SRM is too dark. Something like 4.5 is most likely closer. I'm pretty sure Abner is bittered with hop extract, but thats probably not super critical. Also not nearly enough hops. Less than 10oz? Closer to 20 is probably more accurate. Not sure the reasoning for polyclar either, there is nothing clear about Hill Farmstead beers. I'm also willing to bet sulphate & chloride are higher than 50ppm. Chloride for sure anyway.

J343MY said:

so right off the bat, there are several things about that recipe that don't look right. 7 SRM is too dark. Something like 4.5 is most likely closer. I'm pretty sure Abner is bittered with hop extract, but thats probably not super critical. Also not nearly enough hops. Less than 10oz? Closer to 20 is probably more accurate. Not sure the reasoning for polyclar either, there is nothing clear about Hill Farmstead beers. I'm also willing to bet sulphate & chloride are higher than 50ppm. Chloride for sure anyway.

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Their sours a fairly clear. When I'm up on Wednesday, I'm going to try to get more info.

Sean is awfully friendly. He should be willing to help you out.


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I just finished brewing this recipe. But my OG is nowhere near 1.077, I got 1.054. This is only my 4th brew, maybe my mash efficiency is still not very good.

Everything else went pretty well though!

bluemoose said:

Sean is awfully friendly. He should be willing to help you out.


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I've only seen him a handful of times. A couple weeks ago I was in the new/temp retail area 30 minutes before opening. We exchanged greeting and he got right to filling up some new barrels with an obvious stout. I wanted to talk to him but didn't out of respect. Maybe next time:/

Here is my attempt.



Ended up with an Og of 1.075(only used a 1/2 pound of sugar) and an Fg of 1.012.... Right around 8.4%.

I have only had Abner once and it was over a year ago so I don't specifically know if this is an exact clone.

I will tell you that it is a phenomenal dipa. I went with a 3/1 sulfate to chloride ratio (180ppm/60ppm) and the mouth feel is great and the hop flavor and aroma are really potent.

Would love to get some Abner to do a side by side.

I was always under the impression he had a higher ratio of chlorides over sulfates in his beers - that's why their bitterness isn't sharp and the mouthfeel is slick/creamy.

Glad to hear the brew turned out well! I hope you can get some Abner two and post some side by side notes

InityBrew said:

Here is my attempt.



Ended up with an Og of 1.075(only used a 1/2 pound of sugar) and an Fg of 1.012.... Right around 8.4%.

I have only had Abner once and it was over a year ago so I don't specifically know if this is an exact clone.

I will tell you that it is a phenomenal dipa. I went with a 3/1 sulfate to chloride ratio (180ppm/60ppm) and the mouth feel is great and the hop flavor and aroma are really potent.

Would love to get some Abner to do a side by side.

Click to expand...

Awesome!! I wish you would have told me, I was up there Wednesday and could have grabbed you a growler.

It's all good brother. Pm if you want me to send a bottle of this your way. I just kegged it on Thursday and it will probably be fully carbed by the end of the week.

skibb said:

I was always under the impression he had a higher ratio of chlorides over sulfates in his beers - that's why their bitterness isn't sharp and the mouthfeel is slick/creamy.

Glad to hear the brew turned out well! I hope you can get some Abner two and post some side by side notes

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Yea, I was unsure of this so i kept it close to what I usually do for my ipas, but bumped the sulfates down a little to 180.

Just pulled my first couple of pints of my attempt at this recipe last night. Great beer !!
Mine started out a bit low at 1.068 (I f'd up my mash temp and was way low which might account for my poor mash efficiency) and ended up at 1.012 with an ABV of 7.4%. It has a great nose and great taste. Not sure how it compares to the real thing as it's been a couple years since I've had it but this is a solid beer.

I used RO water and added brewing salts to get a profile of Ca: 111, Mg: 19, Na: 0, Cl: 74, SO4: 251, Cl to SO4 Ratio: 0.29
Was my first time really building water. Would be interesting to see how the beer changes with a different water profile.

I can't say if it tastes like the original, but what I can say is that is the first beer I brewed that is good! Yes, I'm new to homebrewing and I'm really happy now!