Propeller ESB Clone (help)

I'm tinkering with a clone of Propeller ESB, a favourite of mine. I emailed Propeller for details, but haven't heard back. I posted a version of this earlier on someone else's post, but would like more focused feedback.

What I know
www.drinkpropeller.ca posted this:
IBU's- 30
Hops- Willamatte, Warrior.
Malts- Pale, Crystal and Chocolate.
Colour- 15.9°L

www.ratebeer.com posted this:
COMMERCIAL DESCRIPTION
... blend of two-row malts, including pale malt, crystal malt (for body and residual sweetness) and chocolate malt (for its rich flavour and colour). A last small addition of malted wheat helps deliver its pleasing head. Hopping is done to 30 IBUs using a combination of North American Williamette and Fuggle varieties, and English Goldings.

Considering the above somewhat contradictory descriptions, and what I have access to at my LHBS, I've come up with the following partial mash recipe:

Propeller ESB Clone?

OG = 1.055 / FG = 1.016 (5% booze)
Colour = 21 SRM (16 Lovibond) [brown]
IBU = 30

Extract
4.4 lbs Light DME

Partial Mash
3.40 lbs Gambrinus ESB Pale Malt (3-4 SRM)
1.10 lbs Crystal 120L Malt
0.50 lbs Flaked Wheat
0.30 lbs Chocolate Malt

Hops
0.5 oz Zeus (15%, whole) [60 min]
1.0 oz (2/3 Williamette [4.7%]; 1/3 E.K. Goldings [5.6%]) PELLET (15 min)
1.0 oz (2/3 Williamette [4.7%]; 1/3 E.K. Goldings [5.6%]) PELLET (7 min)
1.0 oz (2/3 Williamette [4.7%]; 1/3 E.K. Goldings [5.6%]) PELLET (0 min)

Yeast
Wyeast 1968 London ESB

Does this sound reasonable (or even delicious)?

Breweries often change their recipes, especially when it comes to hops. I'll preface this by saying that I haven't had the beer, but it sounds like you are pushing more into brown ale territory. I'd cut the chocolate malt to ~2 oz, and swap out half of the C120 for C40 to lighten the color and flavor.

Otherwise it looks like a good recipe to me. Sunday I brewed a bitter with 7 lbs Maris Otter, .5 lbs home toasted malt, .5 lbs flaked barley, and .25 lbs C120, hopped with lots of Styrian Goldings, and fermented with 1968. I really like that strain, but it has a tendency to flocculate before fermentation is completely finished and cleaned up. As it gets to the end of fermentation you may need to warm it up and rouse the yeast by stirring and swirling the beer. It will leave a beautifully clear beer within a week or so, great for making something quick.

Good luck.

Oldsock said:

Breweries often change their recipes, especially when it comes to hops. I'll preface this by saying that I haven't had the beer, but it sounds like you are pushing more into brown ale territory. I'd cut the chocolate malt to ~2 oz, and swap out half of the C120 for C40 to lighten the color and flavor.

Otherwise it looks like a good recipe to me. Sunday I brewed a bitter with 7 lbs Maris Otter, .5 lbs home toasted malt, .5 lbs flaked barley, and .25 lbs C120, hopped with lots of Styrian Goldings, and fermented with 1968. I really like that strain, but it has a tendency to flocculate before fermentation is completely finished and cleaned up. As it gets to the end of fermentation you may need to warm it up and rouse the yeast by stirring and swirling the beer. It will leave a beautifully clear beer within a week or so, great for making something quick.

Good luck.

Click to expand...

Cheers! The colour is definitely outside the style guidelines, but that is what the brewery posted on their website (15.9L). Could they have meant 15.9 SRM? I know some people equate Lovibond and SRM instead of doing the calculation, but that seems strange for a brewery. However, the Porter listed on their website seems to be similarly darker than style guidelines if I do the conversion, so maybe that's what happened (see below, SRM = 1.3546 x Lovibond - 0.76):

ESB 15.9L (20.8 SRM) --> more of a Brown than a ESB
Porter 47L (63 SRM) --> more of a Stout than a porter

Anyone think this is likely?