Hill Famstead Abner Clone

Hey, Jeffersonville! I'm in Milton. Anyways, I'll be brewing this recipe this weekend...looks great!

Awesome!! Let me know how it turns out! You're not far from me. Do you ever go to Hill Farmstead?

I haven't been yet, but my neighbor brought over a growler of Abner last summer and it was incredibly tasty!

Yeah I was just there Wednesday. I go a lot. Abner is really good, but I opted for other stuff this trip.

No Abner today. They had it when I got there but they were out by the time I got up to fill. Too bad, I wanted to compare.

That does suck.

MrNickVT said:

Awesome!! Let me know how it turns out! You're not far from me. Do you ever go to Hill Farmstead?

Click to expand...

I just tried the first bottle from my batch of this recipe. It's awesome! The only thing I did different was the addition of a 1/2 cup of honey malt - just because I had it on hand. I also split the dry hopping into two dry hops, one in primary then one in secondary. I was a little shy of the OG at 1.074, but it finished at 1.010. Tastes amazing! Thanks for sharing the recipe.

chato said:

I just tried the first bottle from my batch of this recipe. It's awesome! The only thing I did different was the addition of a 1/2 cup of honey malt - just because I had it on hand. I also split the dry hopping into two dry hops, one in primary then one in secondary. I was a little shy of the OG at 1.074, but it finished at 1.010. Tastes amazing! Thanks for sharing the recipe.

Click to expand...

Awesome to hear! I'm currently drinking the real thing and need to brew this again as well!

Any suggestions for changes to keep the color more in line with the real thing? Planning on brewing this (probably in NOV) but it appears the pics that followed the recipe are much darker than the real thing.

Do you have any info on the SRM of the original?


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

govner1 said:

Do you have any info on the SRM of the original?


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

Click to expand...

Post #20 has a side-by-side


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

govner1 said:

Do you have any info on the SRM of the original?


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

Click to expand...

Post #20 has a side-by-side picture


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

I've seen those but it would be helpful to know the actual SRM from the brewer for the beer if you want to adjust your recipe to match.


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

I'm in Johnson, good to see other Vermonters here!

I was planning on making this pretty soon. The two things I'd add to the conversation is that

1. From what I've seen/been told, Shaun is not very forth coming with information. His idea is that you brew a lot and just figure it out yourself.

2. Starting with RO water is probably a good idea. Generally speaking NEK/Northern Vermont has pretty low mineral content in the ground water. Even though Greensboro/Hardwick area is known for granite, the ground water is very low in minerals compared to other parts of the country. I'd assume in Jeffersonville/Cambridge you'd have similar ground water, and maybe even in Milton but I'd assume it depends on town water vs well water(..?). Shaun says his well water is so important and some take that as in it has a specific mineral content that gives him the signature flavor, but it is probably more the fact that the water is so easy to get the exact water profile, since it is low in everything.

I had a buddy just brew the Everett clone from that same issue of BYO and said the recipe was not right at all, so I wouldn't rule out recipe issues.

Totally agree on recipe issues!

As far as SRM, its been awhile since I've had Abner, but from what I remember it was super light in colour. Like around 4 SRM.

So the grain bill is probably pretty simple. Mostly 2-row, a touch of lighter crystal, and dextrose. I'm also thinking he might be using flaked oats as well.

Another thing I'm thinking is he overplays the importance of his well water, and downplays his yeast. I have a hunch his ale yeast may be more important that most people think.

I finally made it up there a couple of weeks ago. No Abner (though I've had it). I ended up leaving with growlers of Edward, Susan, and Double Galaxy. What struck me was how light they all were. Edward was damn near translucent. And Double Galaxy as a IIPA wasn't much darker.

What I would add to the whole conversation, other than cautioning following BYO "clone" recipes, is that if there is any proportion of any sort of crystal it has got to be super low. And I'm pretty sure if the Caramalt piece is accurate its got to be the Fawcett version of it, which is 12L. Its the same stuff that's purported to be in Heady. I've bought it recently from Farmhouse.

I also second what the previous poster said about the impact of the yeast. I'm currently drinking a IIPA of my own invention that's heavy on Galaxy, Mosaic, and Citra. Its version 2.0 with the first version being brewed with 1056 and this one with Conan (GigaYeast Vermont Ale). All I can say is WOW. Night and day. the first beer was good but this is awesome. Conan adds so much character to the beer AND enhances the hop character. John Kimmich last year I think said that Hill wasn't using Conan...anymore. If he was indeed using Conan at one point, that makes me think he found a suitable replacement strain that also highlights/enhances the hop character or draws out other aspects of the beer.

Regarding the "softness" that people often attribute to Sean's beers, it would be worthwhile to get a few pH readings of his beer, as a higher final beer PH can give the impression of softness and smoother mouthfeel. It also has a side effect of decreasing the perception of bitterness, both with real BU and polyphenol pickup.

And unless he is using a RO system, we can be pretty sure his "well" water is actually of moderate hardness. Given his supposed high BU's in his beer, yet, lack of a sharp bitterness flavor, I would suspect the buffering capacity of his wort is quite high.

Brewing a version of this on SAT. Are people sticking with the <10oz hops for this? Seems one brewer here doubled the whirlpool hops. Anybody else monkeying with the additions?

bierhaus15 said:

Regarding the "softness" that people often attribute to Sean's beers, it would be worthwhile to get a few pH readings of his beer, as a higher final beer PH can give the impression of softness and smoother mouthfeel. It also has a side effect of decreasing the perception of bitterness, both with real BU and polyphenol pickup.

And unless he is using a RO system, we can be pretty sure his "well" water is actually of moderate hardness. Given his supposed high BU's in his beer, yet, lack of a sharp bitterness flavor, I would suspect the buffering capacity of his wort is quite high.

Click to expand...

Agreed, anyone taken pH readings on any of HF's hoppy creations?

How has this recipe turned out for people? Anyone do adjust the BYO recipe and make it better?

For what it's worth. I stumbled on Shaun's original brew blog for HF and there is some useful info about Abner.

http://hillfarmstead.blogspot.com/2010/04/reflections-on-beginning.html?m=1

Shaun mentions that the brew used 70 lbs of hops in 220 gal (7 BBL batch).

With some simple math you can figure out the following:
70 lbs / 220 gal = 0.318 lbs / gal
0.318 lb/gal x 16 oz/lb = 5.0 oz / gal
6 gal batch x 5.00 oz/gal = 30 oz total hops

He also mentions that Abner is triple dry hopped so I imaging that a significant portion of the hops is added then.

Perhaps 12 oz in the kettle / whirlpool and 3 x 6 oz dry hop additions.

I also assume that Shaun is likely using hop extract now to bitter (with the high Ibu this seems like a smart efficiency decision) so that total number of pounds could have changed; however, would still give us good insight to what we need on the homebrew level

Awesome find! For being someone who is notoriously conservative with recipe information, he definitely spills a few beans in the blog.

When I'm reading it for when he says he uses 70 lb for 220 gallons - he states "in the range of 70 pounds worth of hops for a 220 gallon batch of beer"

With his verbiage I think he's letting on that he's already using hop extracts to supplement the massive hop bill he uses for this beer. I've heard of several breweries using hop extract in other stages of the boil other than the bittering addition (like the dry hop). That being said, I'm sure he still uses a LOT of hops... 7 lb per bbl is the highest I have heard anyone using... I would be curious how much is just in the dry hop (I would say likely 2/3 or more)

At my brewery the most we've used is 5 lb/bbl and the packaged yield was about 70%...and I was told that was a good yield for that amount of hops!

I think the reddit post with Shaun also mentioned something along the lines of many additions of centennial and simcoe throughout the boil (I'm paraphrasing greatly) for Edward. Since the hop bills are the same let's assume he's got the same ratios on Edward, Abner, and Ephriam.

He may have more going on than just a bittering, mid-boil and a whirlpool addition.

I've always felt that chinook and Columbus are there as supporters. Warrior for the bittering addition was always my assumption too.

Was reading the other day how Maine Beer Co. uses 6lbs / barrel of dryhop for their beer called dinner. That would be 1lb of dry hops in a 5 gal batch.
Supposedly dry hopping doesn't scale down 1:1 from a professional to homebrew scale.

That or homebrewers have no idea to the amount of hops actually being used.

I've seen good DIPAs brewed with 1-2 lbs per bbl. Also depends on the technique. A brewery down here recently did a DIPA with 7 total lbs per BBL and 5 of those lbs were the dry hop alone.

I notice a flavor contribution from my dry hop. I'd be curious to see the process for some of these NE breweries with heavily aromatic and "soft" IPAs.

orangemen5 said:

Was reading the other day how Maine Beer Co. uses 6lbs / barrel of dryhop for their beer called dinner. That would be 1lb of dry hops in a 5 gal batch.
Supposedly dry hopping doesn't scale down 1:1 from a professional to homebrew scale.

Click to expand...

I saw that on their site a long time ago and it didn't sound right. I sent them an email for clarification and they responded to say it was confusing the way it was written and actually was 6 lbs total, not 6 lbs in the dry hop. 16 oz dry hop in a 5 gal batch would be nuts!

chato said:

I saw that on their site a long time ago and it didn't sound right. I sent them an email for clarification and they responded to say it was confusing the way it was written and actually was 6 lbs total, not 6 lbs in the dry hop. 16 oz dry hop in a 5 gal batch would be nuts!

Click to expand...

I read it in the Sept. BYO 20th anniversary edition. That sounds more reasonable.

So food for thought. Are we sure that 2-row is the base malt. Hill Farmstead's site says "Pale Malt" which leads me to think it is one of the darker pale malts that briess or rahr offer.

Clearly 2-row and pale malt get thrown around interchangeably but 2-row Brewers and 2-row pale are different for briess, rahr, etc...

Also, on the hoppy beers and some Saisons he lists the ingredient as "pale" malt but on Mary it clearly says 2-row.


Why would Edward, abner, etc.. Also not just say 2-row then?