Lost Coast Downtown Brown - Extract Clone

[Duplicate post]

I tried posting in "recipes" but no takers. Since brew#1 is in bottles and I have 60+ cleaned and delabelled empties taking up space and my bucket and carboy are empty, call me reckless, but I figured I might think about getting to brew#2

I drank some Downtown Brown on Saturday while bottling and I think I'd like to go with a clone of that if anyone knows of one. I Googled and found the version below but the person who posted it didn't seem to have tried the original so I don't know whether it's going to be close.

He says to add "carbonate water" to the boil pot. What is he talking about? I should use sparkling mineral water? He also only boils 2.5 gallons of wort then mixes for the ferment to 5 gallons. I assume that's because he has a smaller pot and there's no other technical reason?

===================================================

Downtown Davis Brown Lost Coast Brewing Downtown Brown Ale
(5 gallons, extract and specialty grain)
I came up with a recipe several months ago at a customer’s request for something similar to Downtown Brown Ale by Lost Coast Brewing in Eureka, Calif. I hadn’t tried the beer before he asked for it, but based on his description and some hints at the ingredients from the Lost Coast Web page, I put it together the best I could. Well, the customer really liked it. Mt. Hood makes for an almost noble aroma hop, and the chocolatey, malty body is very appealing.
Sean Mick
Mick’s Homebrew Supplies
Davis, Calif.

Ingredients:
• 3.75 lbs. Alexander’s light malt extract
• 3 lbs. Laaglander light dry malt extract
• 0.5 lb. DeWolf-Cosyn chocolate malt, 350° Lovibond
• 0.25 lb. maltodextrin powder
• 0.5 oz. Chinook whole hops (13.5% alpha acid), for 60 min.
• 2 oz. Mt. Hood whole hops (4.5% alpha acid), 1 oz. for 30 min., 1 oz. for 10 min.
• 1 qt. starter of Wyeast 1272 (American II Ale)
• 3/4 cup corn sugar or 11/4 cup of light DME for priming

Step by Step:
Steep grains for 20 min. in 0.25 gal. of water at 150° F. Strain liquid into main brewpot. Bring water volume to 2.5 gal. with carbonate water (add 1 tsp. chalk if using soft water). Bring to boil and add extract, maltodextrin, and Chinook hops. Boil 30 min. Add 1 oz. Mt. Hood hops and boil another 20 min. Add another 1 oz. Mt. Hood hops and boil 10 min. more. Total boil is 60 minutes. Remove spent hops and cool. Add to 2 gal. preboiled, chilled water in fermenter. Top up to 5 gal. with preboiled, chilled water. Cool to 75° F and add yeast .

Aerate wort. Equip fermenter with blow-off tube or airlock. Primary ferment lasts about a week at 68° to 72° F. Rack to secondary until clarified. Bottle with corn sugar. Carbonation takes about one week; beer matures in two weeks. Enjoy. Alcohol by volume is 4.7%.

OG = 1.048-1.050
FG = 1.014

Looks like he's talking about water chemistry adjustments. If your water is really soft (not sure about Windsor, but Healdsburg isn't - howdy, neighbor!) he's suggesting you add some chalk, which is calcium carbonate. 1g of calcium carbonate in 5g of water will raise your bicarbonates by 32 ppm and your calcium by 21 ppm.

The 2.5 gal is a partial boil and basically just a more manageable size.

I'd recommend skipping the water additions. Most brown ale water chemistry profiles are too jazzed on bicarbonates anyway (I could be wrong, though). If you have a decent sized pot you may want to just do a full boil. In the meantime, you could also head to the Beverage People in Santa Rosa and pick their brains. They're pretty helpful.

Gordie

Thanks Gordie,

I planned on checking with the Beverage People if I couldn't find anything on here. It's where my first batch of ingredients came from.

For my next batch I'll either use this recipe or I'll try a clone of ruby. I really like Downtown Brown Ale.

Just got back from the supply store. I'll be brewing this recipe up tonight. As others suggested I won't be using carbonated water in the recipe.

Also, I don't have 2 gal of preboiled chilled water so I'll just be adding tap water after the boil is done.

This will be my 3rd batch ever. The first was great (newcastle brown ale clone). Second batch still in secondary (widmer hefeweizen clone).

Oh, Downtown Brown. That was one of my go-to beers when I went to school in Davis (go Ags).

My Davis Beers (in no particular order):
-Downtown Brown
-Fat Tire
-Speakeasy Prohibition Ale
-Racer 5
-Barney Flatts Oatmeal Stout
-Sierra Nevada APA (natch)
-Sudwerks on Wednesdays (often to excess)

How does this compare with the original (since the originator never tasted the original beer) ?

Anyone who brewed this compare it to the original (side by side) ?
Had this a year ago can't get more (not distributed here.)

Would love to here an update.

I just tasted this tonight (6 days after bottling) and it is really close to the original. This is my 3rd completed batch and all of them have been clones of one sort or another and I must say that this batch is the closest I've come to an original.

I used this recipe with some slight changes:

Ingredients:
• 3.75 lbs. Alexander’s light malt extract
• 3 lbs. Laaglander light dry malt extract
• 0.5 lb. DeWolf-Cosyn chocolate malt, 350° Lovibond
• 0.25 lb. maltodextrin powder
• 0.5 oz. Chinook whole hops (13.5% alpha acid), for 60 min.
• 2 oz. Mt. Hood whole hops (4.5% alpha acid), 1 oz. for 30 min., 1 oz. for 10 min.
• 1 qt. starter of Wyeast 1272 (American II Ale)
• 3/4 cup corn sugar or 11/4 cup of light DME for priming

Step by Step:
Steep grains for 20 min. in 0.25 gal. of water at 150° F. Strain liquid into main brewpot. Bring water volume to 2.5 gal. with carbonate water (add 1 tsp. chalk if using soft water). Bring to boil and add extract, maltodextrin, and Chinook hops. Boil 30 min. Add 1 oz. Mt. Hood hops and boil another 20 min. Add another 1 oz. Mt. Hood hops and boil 10 min. more. Total boil is 60 minutes. Remove spent hops and cool. Add to 2 gal. preboiled, chilled water in fermenter. Top up to 5 gal. with preboiled, chilled water. Cool to 75° F and add yeast .

I steeped for 30 minutes instead of 20. Also, I steeped in 3 gallons instead of .25 gal. I also did not use carbonated water and I also did not use chalk.

I had to try 1 but I'll let the rest sit another week.

A week or so later and this beer is getting better. I'm nursing it along though cause I don't want to run out. I'll definitely be brewing this again.

My first batch was so tasty that I'm doing my first ever repeat brew.

NOTE: I had some other batches planned but the hops weren't available so I decided to brew Downtown Brown again.

Thanks!! Can't wait to try this one!

Can anyone post an all grain version of this?

adam01 said:

How does this compare with the original (since the originator never tasted the original beer) ?

Anyone who brewed this compare it to the original (side by side) ?
Had this a year ago can't get more (not distributed here.)

Would love to here an update.

Click to expand...

I converted this to all grain and brewed it with my dad. He says it's pretty darn close.

Can you post the recipe?

mwpaul6062 said:

Can you post the recipe?

Click to expand...

sorry this took me so long to look up for you.
5 gallon batch same stats as before

8lb 6-row malt (2-row should be fine too)
1lb vienna
8oz chocolate 350L (i use briess)
6oz crystal 40L (I used a british crystal that tasted darker when i sampled the grain)
2oz roasted barley.

8g chinook leaf 13%AA 55 mins (just an IBU correction from the 60 minute addition)
20g mt. hood leaf 4.5%AA 25 mins
20g mt. hood leaf 4.5%AA 10 mins

I think we pitched WLP001 that day, but we may have gone with a british ale yeast too, like the dry whitbread strain.

Anyone else brew this recently? Especially the a grain version? Looking to brew soon, but I want to know if I need to make any adjustments first...

brewski09 said:

Anyone else brew this recently? Especially the a grain version? Looking to brew soon, but I want to know if I need to make any adjustments first...

Click to expand...

You ever brew this? I need to make this for a friend and am curious on the all grain recipe

RoughandReadyRanch said:

You ever brew this? I need to make this for a friend and am curious on the all grain recipe

Click to expand...

I've brewed it once, but never got to try it (did it as a birthday present for my dad while I was in town, but I live several thousand miles away, so no go on the trying of the beer). He said it was really good, not quite cloned, but I called some major audibles on the grain bill and his sparge setup was new, so we got terrible efficiency.

I am brewing this tomorrow in the AM on my equipment. I'll let you know how I think it turns out.

brewski09 said:

I've brewed it once, but never got to try it (did it as a birthday present for my dad while I was in town, but I live several thousand miles away, so no go on the trying of the beer). He said it was really good, not quite cloned, but I called some major audibles on the grain bill and his sparge setup was new, so we got terrible efficiency.

I am brewing this tomorrow in the AM on my equipment. I'll let you know how I think it turns out.

Click to expand...

I contacted the head brewer at Lost Coast and she told me that the hop bill is willamette so I will be trying a recipe loosely based on yours with willamette in a few days but I had to toss in some more things to get the color up as it wasn't quite dark enough on my software.

RoughandReadyRanch said:

I contacted the head brewer at Lost Coast and she told me that the hop bill is willamette so I will be trying a recipe loosely based on yours with willamette in a few days but I had to toss in some more things to get the color up as it wasn't quite dark enough on my software.

Click to expand...

The Mt. Hood smelled close to Willamette to me now that you mention it. This one seemed to turn out pretty much perfect color though.

It would be great if anyone who has brewed this can compare it side by side with the original. I'd love to brew this but don't get downtown brews in Dallas.

Shelf beer trader. You can trade for it rather easily. Mine was tasting great until it went sour


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew