American Pale Ale Three Floyds Zombie Dust Clone

I just tapped a keg of this clone last week and brewed another batch yesterday. Yesterday's batch I used DIPA Ale Yeast from Omega Labs just for the heck of it. I also used all leaf hops in yesterday's batch. Will be interested to see how it compares to the pellet hops and SafAle yeast. DIPA is supposed to be a culture from Heady Topper. I hope it doesn't go south as there really is no reason to change up the OP's recipe here!

I'm about tired of how finicky Conan is, so I guess I won't use it on this batch. Last time I used S-04 and this time I am using WLP002. I plan to brew the following tomorrow.

2.5 gallon batch

4.5 lb 2 row
8 oz Light Munich
3 oz Cara Pils
3 oz Crystal 60L
3 oz Melanoiden
2 oz Acid malt

3 g Magnum 60 min 12.4% 11 IBUs
7 g Citra 15 min 12.2% 12.5 IBUs
14 g Citra 10 min 12.2% 18.3 IBUs
14 g Citra 5 min 12.2% 10.1 IBUs
14 g Citra 1 min 12.2% 2.2 IBUs
22 g Citra Dry hop for 4-5 days (That's all I have left)

Wlp002/Starter

I have to try this!!!

Very good beer. Its very citrusy, perfect for summer

I'm drinking my first batch of this at the moment. I undershot my expected efficiency by quite a bit, so I ended up with an OG of only 1.052. It finished a little lower also - 1.014. Despite being slightly thin, it still tastes pretty good! I'm only getting a hint of the Citra hop aroma, despite doing the 7-day dryhop. It's been in bottles for almost three weeks now.

Would a thin mash impact hop aromas at all? I'm leaning toward either that, or the fact that I strained all the hops out of the wort before chilling after boil, as being the culprit for not being quite hoppy enough.

I have a second batch of this about to be dryhopped. I also undershot my expected efficiency on that one, but left the hops in the kettle while chilling the wort. It will be interesting to see if I notice a difference.

Epos7 said:

I'm drinking my first batch of this at the moment. I undershot my expected efficiency by quite a bit, so I ended up with an OG of only 1.052. It finished a little lower also - 1.014. Despite being slightly thin, it still tastes pretty good! I'm only getting a hint of the Citra hop aroma, despite doing the 7-day dryhop. It's been in bottles for almost three weeks now.

Would a thin mash impact hop aromas at all? I'm leaning toward either that, or the fact that I strained all the hops out of the wort before chilling after boil, as being the culprit for not being quite hoppy enough.

I have a second batch of this about to be dryhopped. I also undershot my expected efficiency on that one, but left the hops in the kettle while chilling the wort. It will be interesting to see if I notice a difference.

Click to expand...

I think the brulosophy blog would be interested in the results of this "experiment."

I brewed this a few years ago when I first started brewing. Made a ton of mistakes. It still ended up good. Just not my best work. It has Been bugging me for quite a while, and now that I have some patience and a better setup I Will be brewing this in a couple of weeks. Is this a 90 min boil? Or 60 min?

I beleive this is 60min. Thats what I did and it ended amazingly good.

I do 60 as well and mine turns out great every time!!!

I've made this twice now from the extract recipe. The first batch I fermented 4 gallons and it is delicious and I have 5 gallons fermenting right now. I had 4 gallons of wort that I topped up to 5 so we'll see how that goes. Oh and I had to use Mosaic both times because my store was out of Citra.

I've made an all Mosaic IPA (different recipe) and it is damn good as well!

Hi guys and especially the thread starter,

In comparison to the recipe on the first page, what would you say are the main points that could be improved to get even closer to the Three Floyds Zombie Dust?

I'm about to brew that beer, but I was wondering if I should go with the original recipe or if the 250+ pages revealed much room for improvement.

Thanks!

dude1 said:

Hi guys and especially the thread starter,



In comparison to the recipe on the first page, what would you say are the main points that could be improved to get even closer to the Three Floyds Zombie Dust?



I'm about to brew that beer, but I was wondering if I should go with the original recipe or if the 250+ pages revealed much room for improvement.



Thanks!

Click to expand...

It works for me and is pretty much spot on IMO. As with any type of recipe though, results may vary from brewer to brewer.

Two questions:
My LHBS doesn't have Melanoiden.How much of an effect does it have and is there a sub?
Does the 04 give off fruity esters in this recipe? I brewed a different citra type IPA with 05 and the cleanness of the yeast let the citra shine though.Will the 04 distract from that?

I prefer s04 over s05. It blends well with citra

You can try biscuit malt as a sub

JONNYROTTEN said:

Two questions:
My LHBS doesn't have Melanoiden.How much of an effect does it have and is there a sub?
Does the 04 give off fruity esters in this recipe? I brewed a different citra type IPA with 05 and the cleanness of the yeast let the citra shine though.Will the 04 distract from that?

Click to expand...

04 will enhance the Citra. 05 just won't get in the way of it. If going 04, make sure you keep ferm temps low-mid 60's, otherwise you can get nanners.

JONNYROTTEN said:

Two questions:
My LHBS doesn't have Melanoiden.How much of an effect does it have and is there a sub?
Does the 04 give off fruity esters in this recipe? I brewed a different citra type IPA with 05 and the cleanness of the yeast let the citra shine though.Will the 04 distract from that?

Click to expand...

Where do you live? I bought a pound of Melanoiden by accident (I was in the store with my 3 year old and she was going for the bottles, meant to grab something else) I'll give/send it to you if you want.

--0o0o0-- said:

Where do you live? I bought a pound of Melanoiden by accident (I was in the store with my 3 year old and she was going for the bottles, meant to grab something else) I'll give/send it to you if you want.

Click to expand...

That would be mighty nice but the shipping wouldn't be worth it for a pound..But thank you

JONNYROTTEN said:

That would be mighty nice but the shipping wouldn't be worth it for a pound..But thank you

Click to expand...

You call it. I'm in Westchester (I'm assuming you're on LI, NY) and have my second kid coming in a few weeks. I've got a batch of this ZD clone fermenting right now and probably won't get another brew day in before the kid comes. I had my store grind it. It's two weeks old. I'd hate for it to go to waste, plus I'm trying to throw as much good will into the world as I can right now.

Has the recipe changed at all?
Has anyone tried FWH and all hops at whirlpool or at 180 deg?
Doing a double batch so that a full pund of citra and want the best possible beer

phyllobeddo said:

I'm about tired of how finicky Conan is, so I guess I won't use it on this batch. Last time I used S-04 and this time I am using WLP002. I plan to brew the following tomorrow.

2.5 gallon batch

4.5 lb 2 row
8 oz Light Munich
3 oz Cara Pils
3 oz Crystal 60L
3 oz Melanoiden
2 oz Acid malt

3 g Magnum 60 min 12.4% 11 IBUs
7 g Citra 15 min 12.2% 12.5 IBUs
14 g Citra 10 min 12.2% 18.3 IBUs
14 g Citra 5 min 12.2% 10.1 IBUs
14 g Citra 1 min 12.2% 2.2 IBUs
22 g Citra Dry hop for 4-5 days (That's all I have left)

Wlp002/Starter

Click to expand...

Have you tried this yet?

JONNYROTTEN said:

Has the recipe changed at all?
Has anyone tried FWH and all hops at whirlpool or at 180 deg?
Doing a double batch so that a full pund of citra and want the best possible beer

Click to expand...

I recently did a massive citra IPA (not this one but kinda similar) with a hop shot at 60 and a 1lb at 180 for an hour. Huge flavor and aroma but the bitterness was weak and it lacked the mouthfeel of a really good IPA. I would suggest using at least a few additions of boil hops.

I recently remade it and moved some of those steep hops to boil hops and its a much more well rounded beer.

joshb said:

Have you tried this yet?

Click to expand...

No. Not yet. It's kegged with priming sugar and waiting to go into the fridge. I don't have room for it right now. The Strawberry Blonde keg is about empty, though. I might tap it next week.

I ended up double dry hopping it. 22 grams @ day 9 to day 13 and then 1 oz @ day 16 to day 21. There was tons of hop debris. I need to cold crash it for a few days before tapping the keg.

My latest batch of this recipe used whole leaf hops and Omega Labs DIPA Ale yeast which is supposed to be a clone of the Heady Topper yeast, Conan. I really like this batch but so far am unsure if the leaf hops or the yeast is what I'm digging. It's really hard to mess this beer up! I've probably made it around 10 times.

Has anyone experienced some green apple on this when missing the OG by a significant amount? I've brewed this three times now and on my second batch only hit 1.047. The beer finished at 1.013 and I overcarbed it a bit. It's been in bottles for three weeks now and I'm getting strong green apple on the nose and palate. I'm not a big fan and my first thought was acetaldehyde, but three other people I've served it to think it's fine. I'm wondering with the beer being drier than it's supposed to be and being overcarbed, if that's throwing off the malt/hops balance and bringing out some green apple. It doesn't seem to appear until between 2 and 3 weeks in bottle.

I noticed the same thing with my first batch (1.053 to 1.014) between 2 and 3 weeks in bottle, but it cleaned up and disappeared. I don't seem to be so fortunate with this batch.

I've got my third attempt at this bottled, but I need to wait another couple weeks before I can drink it. That one I hit 1.056 and finished at 1.014 so I'm hoping it will be closer to the intended recipe.

Haven't noticed much bitterness on the two batches I've been able to drink so far, but maybe that's the intention? I followed the hop schedule in the recipe including the dry hop, although I used whole cones instead of pellets.

I doubled the hops, and I used whole cone...1 full pound.
It is a very drinkable beer.
I took it to brewfest, and they loved it.

The batch I have conditioning right now was dry hopped with a combination of cones and pellets, so it will be interesting to see how that compares to my all-cone attempts. I think I'm going to take another crack at this in a couple weeks using only pellets in boil and dry hop for another reference point. I love the flavor of the grain bill in this beer, just not getting much hop character yet. Could be the whole cone hops, which so far have been almost a year old (though packaged in nitrogen and stored in a freezer).

I'm also wondering if the green apple I'm getting is the result of hop debris in the bottle. Will have to do a better job keeping that out.

joshb said:

Have you tried this yet?

Click to expand...

So, I tapped the keg tonight and it's.....great! Awesome Citra aroma hits you in the face, and the taste does not disappoint at all. I'm totally happy with this one, and I'm very critical of what I brew. SWMBO, who doesn't care much for pales, IPAs, has already had a glass or three of this one. This keg will NOT last long. Stoked.

10 day grain to glass ???
So 8 day ferment,dry hop at day 5 and 2 day keg carb...Doable?? Fermenting now for a party.

JONNYROTTEN said:

10 day grain to glass ???
So 8 day ferment,dry hop at day 5 and 2 day keg carb...Doable?? Fermenting now for a party.

Click to expand...

I just did something very similar. 9 days in keg, dry hopped on day 5 when gravity was about 1.020. Added priming sugar when I racked it and the pressure has stopped rising after 4 more days. So this could easily be 13 days grain to glass, but I'm going to target 21 since I'm not in a rush.

If I had fermented a little warmer maybe it would have finished primary sooner. Could have taken a day or two off the dry hop too.

I was very surprised how quick the pressure increased from the natural carbonation. I sealed the lid with about 8 psi and by 3 days I was around 25 psi (72F ambient). It creeped up a few more on day 3 but I think it's done now.

I am brewing this one today and using Wyeast 1335 (mashing a touch higher at 154F).

Regarding the yeast, am I looking to ferment low to keep it clean or a bit higher to get a more English feel to this beer? I haven't tried Zombie Dust so it doesn't really matter either way but wondered what people prefer?

I left out the dry hops completely due to time restrictions for a party and this is a mighty fine beer...I might just brew the same way again for an awesome pale ale.

Sorry to dig the zombie out of his grave, but I should be bottling this on friday and have further question:

Carbonation level for bottling, bcjp said medium to high carb. I was thinking 2.5 with table sugar. Is that fine?

For gelatin fining, should I go with 1/2 Tsp for my 2.5Gal batch ?

Thanks

matzou said:

Sorry to dig the zombie out of his grave, but I should be bottling this on friday and have further question:

Carbonation level for bottling, bcjp said medium to high carb. I was thinking 2.5 with table sugar. Is that fine?

For gelatin fining, should I go with 1/2 Tsp for my 2.5Gal batch ?

Thanks

Click to expand...

I do 2.4 volumes, but 2.5 would probably be ok.

For gelatin, I do 1/2 packet of Knox gelatin for a 5-6 gallon batch. I don't know the volume of a packet, but the beer comes out crystal clear. I follow THESE instructions.

I´ll go with 2.4volume then and try 3.5gram of gelatin for my 2.5gal batch.

Thanks for the answer

Just got notification from More Beer! that my order for the grain and yeast for this brew has shipped and should be here Thursday! Seeing as I have NO way of getting the real deal, I am making one small, tiny change to the recipe..I am going to be subbing Columbus hops in place of the Citra..or maybe even Chinook...Or maybe a 50/50 with those two? It will certainly be an IPA with the high alpha ratings those 2 hops have, just not as 'citrusy' as Citra..

Now, if someone were willing to mail me a bottle of the real deal..hint, hint..Hit me up with a PM and I can give you my address and e-mail to send a paypal invoice to cover the postage.. Oh, and cost of the bottle of brew..

I couldn't imagine not using Citra in this beer, but to each his own. I live like 90 minutes from triple F, and I have to practically sit at the liquor stores on Wednesday mornings to get the stuff.

I, personally, like my homebrew better... but from bottle date to delivery was like 9 days. Mine sat in the keg conditioning for almost 2 months before it was gone, so I don't think it's a fair comparison. I've got a 12 pack here of the original and I'm going to let it condition out for awhile before trying another one.

I agree, Citra is pretty important in that recipe.

Also agree. Columbus and Chinook are not what you want for this.