Beamish Irish Stout Clone Recipe ?

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gresc

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Folks, has anyone brewed BYO 150's version of Beamish Stout ? If so, how close to the original did it come ? Thinking of brewing it this weekend...

Also, the recipes I've seen add cane sugar which I've never used ; I'm assuming this will make the beer "dry" but does it end up adding any sweetness to it ?
 
I haven't looked, so I have no idea if you'd have any better luck finding a Murphy's Stout recipe, but I've tasted those beers side-by side and I can't tell the difference.

-J
 
Beamish is a fabulous stout. So if the clone is a good one then it should be good.
I've not seen the recipe so I can't comment.
Any sugar will dry a beer out. The question is how refined it is.
The more refined it is the less flavour it will offer and the more fermentable it will be.
Does the recipe comment on the particulars of the sugar?
If not then it won't really matter if it is cane or beet sugar.
 
Beamish is quite good, can you post the entire recipe? I'd like to see it.
OG=1.039 FG=1.008 IBU=26 SRM=40 ABV=4.0%
5.88lb 2-row
8oz wheat malt
6oz cane sugar
4oz crystal 60L
6oz chocolate malt
4.5oz roasted barley (500L)
1.5oz black patent (500L)
3.5AAU Challenger hops (60 min)
3.0AAU Kent Goldings hops (60 min)
1AAU hallertau hersbrucker hops (15 mins)
1tsp irish moss
Wyeast 1968 (london ESB) or white labs WLP002 (english ale) yeast (1qt starter)

Mash at 149F in 9.5qts water for 60 mins. Collect 4g wort, add 2.5g water, boil for 90 minutes, adding hops as indicated. Add sugar and irish moss for final 15 mins of boil. Ferment at 70F.

extract w/ grains version:
Reduce 2-row malt to 8oz, and add:
8oz light DME
3.3lb can light LME (late addition)

Steep grains in 3qt water at 149F for 30 mins. Rinse with 1.5qts water at 170F. Add water to make 3g, stir in DME and bring to boil.
Boil for 60 minutes, adding hops as indicated. Add LME and sugar and irish moss with 15 mins left in boil. Cool, top off to 5g, and Ferment at 70F.
 
yup, I'll post once it's ready. Going to follow the clone recipe exactly to baseline it. I'll let you know how it came; I'm going to keg this one. Have to wait until next weekend though; I couldn't score hersbrucker hops at my LHBS.
 
Anyone that's done this recipe care to comment on how it came out? Beamish is SWMBO's favorite beer, and I'd like to know how close this recipe came out.
 
Yeah. Doing a second brew today of this. First batch was superb. When it was young, felt i had used too much chocolate malt and was going to trim the quantity down to 4 oz but over the next week, the excess chocolate flavour dropped out and it finished very close to the original. I spiked the first batch with extra malt extract leaving it at 5.0abv but this batch i will follow the recipe and not add extra. I used to drink this on draught ten years ago and i remember it was a session beer, drunk for the flavour rather than just getting drunk so the extra alcohol didnt suit it. Definately one to brew and savour with your buddies when its raining outdoors...
 
I've spent time in Ireland in Cork (Home of Beamish) and Dublin (Home of Guiness) and did considerable side by side test in both places and many other places.

The Guinness in Ireland IS different to else where (Better) I don't drink Guiness any anywhere else but Ireland. I still prefer Beamish though. I'm not saying it's better, just more to my taste.
 
I've spent time in Ireland in Cork (Home of Beamish) and Dublin (Home of Guiness) and did considerable side by side test in both places and many other places.

SWMBO and I did the same thing when we were in Ireland and maybe it was just placebo (or not) but it did taste quite different; better.

That being said, I too enjoy Beamish better so i'm probably going to be brewing this soon, maybe my first All Grain. I'm glad to see it turns out pretty close to the original.
 
Well, its in the fermenter now, should be finished by the end of the week and then i will give it a week to condition in the cask before drinking.

I notice that you guys in the US use a long maturing period. Here in the UK, most of us drink our beers very young. Thats partly because the cask conditioning means the beer is still live and hence it doesnt keep very long but it is also because here in the pubs, real ale is always very young. A micro brewery will aim to get its beer sold seven days after starting the ferment! It will sit for a few days in the pub cellar and then all be sold within two to three days before spoiling. So most ales are consumed within two weeks of the start of the ferment!

Keep brewing - keep it real....
 
The Guinness in Ireland IS different to else where (Better) I don't drink Guiness any anywhere else but Ireland. I still prefer Beamish though. I'm not saying it's better, just more to my taste.

The Guiness in Ireland is almost a different beer than the one in the states. I think the stuff served in the US is awful, I never liked Guiness until I moved to Dublin.

Beamish is hangover beer to me. I tend to have really rough hangovers from it that I don't get from Guiness.
 
I'm a not a stout fan, but I do like a Beamish. The best pint of stout I ever had was a Beamish in a pub across the street from the Guiness factory. I thought I read in a Michael Jackson book that Beamish is different from other dry stouts in that there is ZERO roasted barley. The roast flavor only comes from the black patent and chocolate malts. Is this true and if so does anyone have a Beamish recipe sans the roasted barley?

Thanks
 
Beamish is different from other dry stouts in that there is ZERO roasted barley. The roast flavor only comes from the black patent and chocolate malts. Is this true and if so does anyone have a Beamish recipe sans the roasted barley?

Oh my god, a post about Beamish! This makes my day. I lived about a hundred yards from the brewery in Cork for two years and it really became my second home. Not to mention it's my choice of stout when I'm back in Ireland. The brewery and it's history have sorta become an obsession of mine, even though those *****ebags at Heineken bought it out and closed the brewery...

First, whatever you heard about it having no roasted barley is wrong. The Beamish grist, is as follows: Pale Malt, roasted barley, wheat malt, with a good portion of sugar of around 10%. The grain is mashed around 150-52 and the wort is diluted to 1.040 from the kettle. I don't know where the BYO recipe came up with their recipe. I have been in the brew house and seen sacks of roasted barley and even the brewery tour mentions roasted b. Hopping rates are higher than Murphy's and Guinness.

I have been working on a recipe for Beamish for a long time. I have come very close - but I can't say I've cloned it quite yet. Fresh Beamish has has a slight bitter chocolate flavor with a bit of burnt/smokey roastiness and a pronounced bitterness. Funny enough, Murphy's once had a popular TV commercial that basically extolled how smooth and NOT bitter it was - a direct 'attack' if you will on their then biggest competitor in Cork, Beamish!

This will get you very close to the real thing:

80% Pale malt (maris otter is fine, but unnecessary)
10% wheat malt
6% roasted barley
4% chocolate malt

Goldings @ 60 for 28 IBU and 0.5 oz goldings at flameout.
Pacman yeast (fermented low) has given me the best results, though us-05 could work in a pinch. (OG 1040 - FG 1008)

Hope that helps! It's good that other people have an interest in Ireland's best dry stout! :rockin:
 
Oh my god, a post about Beamish! This makes my day. I lived about a hundred yards from the brewery in Cork for two years and it really became my second home. Not to mention it's my choice of stout when I'm back in Ireland. The brewery and it's history have sorta become an obsession of mine, even though those *****ebags at Heineken bought it out and closed the brewery...

First, whatever you heard about it having no roasted barley is wrong. The Beamish grist, is as follows: Pale Malt, roasted barley, wheat malt, with a good portion of sugar of around 10%. The grain is mashed around 150-52 and the wort is diluted to 1.040 from the kettle. I don't know where the BYO recipe came up with their recipe. I have been in the brew house and seen sacks of roasted barley and even the brewery tour mentions roasted b. Hopping rates are higher than Murphy's and Guinness.

I have been working on a recipe for Beamish for a long time. I have come very close - but I can't say I've cloned it quite yet. Fresh Beamish has has a slight bitter chocolate flavor with a bit of burnt/smokey roastiness and a pronounced bitterness. Funny enough, Murphy's once had a popular TV commercial that basically extolled how smooth and NOT bitter it was - a direct 'attack' if you will on their then biggest competitor in Cork, Beamish!

This will get you very close to the real thing:

80% Pale malt (maris otter is fine, but unnecessary)
10% wheat malt
6% roasted barley
4% chocolate malt

Goldings @ 60 for 28 IBU and 0.5 oz goldings at flameout.
Pacman yeast (fermented low) has given me the best results, though us-05 could work in a pinch. (OG 1040 - FG 1008)

Hope that helps! It's good that other people have an interest in Ireland's best dry stout! :rockin:
post from 2010, well I'll give it a try :D

@bierhaus15 did you have change to get the perfect recipe? I love beamish and I'd like to replicate it. Would you mind to write a step by step guide how you've achieved the best results? It would be much appreciated
 
post from 2010, well I'll give it a try :D

@bierhaus15 did you have change to get the perfect recipe? I love beamish and I'd like to replicate it. Would you mind to write a step by step guide how you've achieved the best results? It would be much appreciated

Well, I can't say I perfected the recipe, although I've come close to the flavor of the original stuff, before Heineken closed the brewery and moved production.

The 'original' recipe was brewed at high gravity and diluted at packing. It used pale, stout malt, roasted barley, wheat, and wheat/barley syrup. Stout malt is a relatively low color base malt with more enzymatic potential. The wheat is used as cheap extract and the barley/wheat syrup were added in the kettle to increase yield. It is worth noting that these syrups have a similar fermentability to malt but provide no color and flavor; sugar is not a good substitute, although it is not really needed anyways. Hops were a mix of German and UK varieties, but all that really matters is getting a clean bitterness. Yeast is a rather neutral strain that has high attenuation and flocculation.

My current recipe and closest is 72.5% 2-Row, 15% Wheat Malt, 10% Roasted Barley, and 2.5% Black Patent. The roast character was something I always had a hard time matching and eventually found that Breiss RB (300L) with a small amount of BP malt provides a similar flavor. A 60:40 blend of UK roast and chocolate malt also works, but isn't quite the same. O.G: is 1.039 and F.G: is 1.007. I use moderately hard water profile, diluting with RO to around 120 ppm ALK and target 100 ppm Ca for final wort. Mash pH around 5.2. Calcium chloride is used, no sulfate, and chlorides are around 75 ppm mash. For hops, I prefer Northdown and Goldings, but any clean bittering hop to 30-35 IBU works. Not looking for much hop character. As for yeast, I now use the actual Beamish yeast with pure O2, but you can easily substitute it with a clean and attenuative strain. Pacman has worked very well for me, although WY1084, WY1335, WY1056, or even dry Nottingham is acceptable. Just avoid any fruity strains and keep temperatures relatively low. IMO, the key to this beer is achieving a dry, smooth roast character with a very clean fermentation profile. Good luck.
 
Very cool to see this post come back to life : after reading several blogs I attempted this beer
I do small 4 gallon batches :

62% marris Otter
8% wheat
8% roasted barley
3.5% chocolate
11.5% caramel 30
7% dextrose

4.9% ABV
Sorry for the weird percentages was using up some extra grains -

east Kent Golding for hops just 1 oz at 60min

I used Irish ale yeast ( I believe the Guinness strain) .
Probably the best beer I have made - not as smooth/ sweet as the original , very roasty . A lot of people asked if I brewed it with coffee !

when I do it again i will drop the dextrose and increase the maris otter- possibly increase the wheat a fraction and decrease the chocolate or roasted barley . Also will increase the hops a touch from 20-30 IBU
 
Any thoughts on using White Labs Irish Ale strain for this beer? Been wanting to brew this for a while and I've really liked what that strain has done for my other dry Irish stout batches.
 
I haven’t used that yeast but their website says from one of the longest producing stout producers in Ireland - so I imagine like the wyeast 1084 it’s probably the Guinness yeast . Cool that @bierhaus15 has the actual yeast !
 
Guinness used 3 different yeasts depending on the product. It is likely that WY1084 is from their bottle conditioned Extra Stout, before it was pasteurized in the mid 90's. Fermented cool (64-66F) it should be fine for this beer.
 
Well, I can't say I perfected the recipe, although I've come close to the flavor of the original stuff, before Heineken closed the brewery and moved production.

The 'original' recipe was brewed at high gravity and diluted at packing. It used pale, stout malt, roasted barley, wheat, and wheat/barley syrup. Stout malt is a relatively low color base malt with more enzymatic potential. The wheat is used as cheap extract and the barley/wheat syrup were added in the kettle to increase yield. It is worth noting that these syrups have a similar fermentability to malt but provide no color and flavor; sugar is not a good substitute, although it is not really needed anyways. Hops were a mix of German and UK varieties, but all that really matters is getting a clean bitterness. Yeast is a rather neutral strain that has high attenuation and flocculation.

My current recipe and closest is 72.5% 2-Row, 15% Wheat Malt, 10% Roasted Barley, and 2.5% Black Patent. The roast character was something I always had a hard time matching and eventually found that Breiss RB (300L) with a small amount of BP malt provides a similar flavor. A 60:40 blend of UK roast and chocolate malt also works, but isn't quite the same. O.G: is 1.039 and F.G: is 1.007. I use moderately hard water profile, diluting with RO to around 120 ppm ALK and target 100 ppm Ca for final wort. Mash pH around 5.2. Calcium chloride is used, no sulfate, and chlorides are around 75 ppm mash. For hops, I prefer Northdown and Goldings, but any clean bittering hop to 30-35 IBU works. Not looking for much hop character. As for yeast, I now use the actual Beamish yeast with pure O2, but you can easily substitute it with a clean and attenuative strain. Pacman has worked very well for me, although WY1084, WY1335, WY1056, or even dry Nottingham is acceptable. Just avoid any fruity strains and keep temperatures relatively low. IMO, the key to this beer is achieving a dry, smooth roast character with a very clean fermentation profile. Good luck.
Amazing description, thanks for sharing your experience! I'll give it a try.
Do you obtain with this recipes the classic Beamish creamy texture?
 
@Moser88 If you haven't seen it, there's a Chop & Brew episode where Micheal Dawson brews his version of it. C&B ep 24 I brewed that same recipe, but I wasn't too impressed with my version.

I'd like to retry it or the BYO version mentioned since it had been a few years.
 
@Moser88 If you haven't seen it, there's a Chop & Brew episode where Micheal Dawson brews his version of it. C&B ep 24 I brewed that same recipe, but I wasn't too impressed with my version.

I'd like to retry it or the BYO version mentioned since it had been a few years.
Thanks for the link, I'll give a look at it, I'm sure I can learn something more.
Are you also a Beamish fan? :D

I attach also the recipes straight from the book, maybe some of you is interested to read the whole article (not much more than what has been already said)

Screenshot 2020-05-03 at 16.42.30.png
 
Thanks for the link, I'll give a look at it, I'm sure I can learn something more.
Are you also a Beamish fan? :D

I attach also the recipes straight from the book, maybe some of you is interested to read the whole article (not much more than what has been already said)

View attachment 678629


I've never had it unfortunately. At the time I was looking to do a stout, I saw that on Chop & Brew. I've always liked the show (as well as BrewingTV when it was on), so I figured I'd give Dawson's version a go. I'll have to give the BYO version a try.

I don't know if Beamish is still made. If it is, one of the guys in my club is from Ireland. Really cool guy and a hell of a brewer. I may hit him up on bringing a bottle back to sample if he's able. I'd love to try it.
 
Yes it is still made (by Heineken) and not at the original brewery which was sadly closed. There is a very cool book about the History of the Brewery that is available and even gives break downs of some of their early brews.
 

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How would you prime this kind of bier in terms of volumes of CO2? Somebody says between 1,2 and 1,5 volumes others between 1,5 and 2. What would you suggest?
 
I like my beers around 2-2.5 volumes generally , so I would aim closer to 2 . I bottle so this is relatively easy to experiment with a few bottles add extra priming sugar . But to each their own !
 
So, at the end it's done, here my Irish stout inspired to Beasmish.
I'm completely satisifed with it, it's also my first home made beer and it's completely exceeded my expectetions. This is also thank to you all that answered my questions and supported me with the base recipe.

Here what I've used:

69.6% Pale ale
14.6% Wheat
9.5% black barley 1125 EBC
1.2% Roasted Black 1250 EBC
1.2% Roasted Chocolate B 900 EBC
3.9% Cane Sugar Boil — 15 min
Hops
26 IBU — Challenger 5% — Boil — 60 min
4 IBU — East Kent Goldings (EKG) 4.9% — Boil — 15 min
Yeast
Wyeast 1084

Irish moss 15 min

Carbonation 2.1 C02 vol.

106719262_10223000956874626_7707057135148835245_o.jpg


Thank you all! Cheers!
 
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Congratulations! That looks great- quite an accomplishment for a first homebrew! Also major props for reviving a 10 year old thread, this thread to me epitomizes the homebrewing online community-just a bunch of folks looking to help each other out--will now have to brew my own and post it....
 
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