Help me choose between these two Bell's Two Hearted recipes

Hey, all.

So, I've gotten two excellent-looking recipes for Bell's Two Hearted Ale from HBT members. One is a straight extract brew, the other is a mini-mash. I'm not set up for all-grain yet, so those are my limits.

Please help me choose between them, and thanks! Oh, and for the yeast, I'll be harvesting Bell's yeast from their bottles.

Here's one from member s3n8:


<<Two Hearted Ale clone
Brew Type: Extract
Style: American IPA
Batch Size: 5.00 gal
Boil Volume: 6.34 gal
Boil Time: 60 min

Ingredients Amount Item Type % or IBU
7.00 lb Amber Dry Extract (12.5 SRM) Dry Extract 74.6 %
0.50 lb Cara-Pils/Dextrine (2.0 SRM) Grain 5.3 %
0.50 lb Caramel/Crystal Malt - 20L (20.0 SRM) Grain 5.3 %
0.50 lb Munich Malt (9.0 SRM) Grain 5.3 %
1.50 oz Centennial [10.00%] (60 min) Hops 49.0 IBU
1.00 oz Centennial [10.00%] (15 min) Hops 16.2 IBU
0.50 oz Centennial [10.00%] (5 min) Hops 3.3 IBU
1.00 oz Centennial [10.00%] (Dry Hop 7 days) Hops -
0.88 lb Corn Sugar (Dextrose) (0.0 SRM) Sugar 9.4 %

Estimated Original Gravity: 1.071 SG (1.056-1.075 SG)
Measured Original Gravity: 1.076 SG
Estimated Final Gravity: 1.018 SG (1.010-1.018 SG)
Measured Final Gravity: 1.016 SG>>




and here's a partial mash recipe from the estimable and ubiquitous YooperBrew:

<<2 pounds vienna malt
.5 pounds crystal 10
.33 pounds carapils
1 pound 2-row.
4.5 pounds DME

.5 ounce Centennial (11%) 60 mins
.5 ounce Centennial (11%) 45 mins
.5 ounce Centennial (11%) 30 mins
.5 ounce Centennial (11%) 15 mins
.33 ounce Centennial 0 mins
.33 ounce Centennial dry hop

Steep (mash) grains at 152 for 45 minutes. Add water to bring up to boil volume, and add extract.

This is a PM recipe, but it's easy to do in a grain bag. Steep those grains as directed, in 1.2 gallons of water, and then sparge (rinse) with 170 degree water by lifting up the grain bag and pouring the sparge water over it. (Or, follow DeathBrewer's tutorial).>>

**crickets**

Both of them look pretty good. I like the idea of the corn sugar to help dry things out. I would lean toward YooperBrew's hop bill and s3n8's grain bill myself.

Personally I'd go the opposite direction, Yooperbrew's grain bill and s3n8's hop schedule. I think Two Hearted has a simple and light grain profile and and the bigger late hop additions of s3n8's recipe will give you that big Centennial flavor and aroma you want in Two Hearted.

Iechyd Da said:

Personally I'd go the opposite direction, Yooperbrew's grain bill and s3n8's hop schedule. I think Two Hearted has a simple and light grain profile and and the bigger late hop additions of s3n8's recipe will give you that big Centennial flavor and aroma you want in Two Hearted.

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Having tasted the results of my grain and hop bill I agree, but IMO I think Yoopers hop bill seems a little light for 2HA.

My grain bill will get you a higher gravity than the real 2HA. Likewise, it might also probably be a little higher IBU than the original. My recipe came from an AHS kit that was modified a bit to suit my tastes. I like higher gravity and higher IBU brews. Yoopers is probably a little closer to the original (1.055 OG and 50 IBU by my calcs), but I like mine more. If you are looking for a true clone, go for Yoopers. If you like a a little heavier brew with a little more bitterness, go mine. If you are adventurous, take the good points from both, and make your own recipe.

Digging around on bells site tells me 2HA OG is 1.058, but they do not have any info on the IBUs. The Northern Brewer clone kit is 1.064 and about 60 IBUs.

It's not MY recipe- I found it somewhere online. I think I posted the source in the original thread. Not that I'm disclaiming that it may be a good recipe- but I've never personally tried it.

I do love Two Hearted, though, and will make one by spring. I do agree that it's pretty hoppy, and the hops should be increased. I'd hop with the first schedule, looking at them side by side.

Here's another PM recipe for you (I plan to do it AG next time) (see my recipe in my recipe dropdown for more details). Note that I use BOTH munich and vienna malts:

Recipe Type: Partial Mash
Yeast: Safale US-05
Yeast Starter: no
Additional Yeast or Yeast Starter: no
Batch Size (Gallons): 11
Original Gravity: 1.056
Final Gravity: 1.012
Boiling Time (Minutes): 60
IBU: 49
Color: 4.7 SRM
Primary Fermentation (# of Days & Temp): 3 weeks at 65F
Tasting Notes: Was cloudier than Bell's Two Hearted Ale (edit: but has since cleared up).

My clone of Bell's Two Hearted Ale.

Brewed 8/23/08

12 lbs. Briess Pilsen DME (i.e. extra-light)

1 lb. 2-row
2 lbs. vienna
2 lbs. munich
1 lb. crystal 10L
1 lb. carapils
1 lb. wheat

Partial mash @ 152F for 60 mins.

Centennial: whole leaf @ unknown %AA (assumed 9%)
2 oz. @ 60 min.
1 oz @ 15 min.
1 oz. @ 10 min.
1 oz. @ 5 min.
2 oz. @ 0 min.
2 oz. dry hop in primary

I will leave out the wheat for future brews of this recipe.

I have a glass of this almost every night, quite tasty!

YooperBrew said:

It's not MY recipe- I found it somewhere online. I think I posted the source in the original thread. Not that I'm disclaiming that it may be a good recipe- but I've never personally tried it.

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You're right, Yooper. I forgot to put that in. It's from BYO's Clone Brews, I believe.

And Baron, thanks so much. I'd be making a 5.5 gallon batch, so if I tried yours, I suppose I could just halve it?

The following is also an excerpt from an interesting post from a blogger who had a conversation with Bells about cloning Two-Hearted:

<<Bell’s was very helpful and offered some tips. Perhaps the wisest words were that Two Hearted is really an exercise in balance and there’s no need to make it more complex than it is. They confirmed the widely known Centennial hops, and said the malt is US 2-row and and some light caramel malt. They also suggested to use a different beer to harvest Bell’s yeast. THA is pretty high alcohol and that I could get a better starter from a smaller beer.>>


The full post can be found here.



I think the advice to use Yooper's grain bill and s3n8's (l33t for senate, perhaps? A brewing Senator?) hop schedule is a good one. This has turned into a housemate-appeasing batch (I asked what their favorite beer was), so I want to make it as close to the original as possible. This will be my first partial-mash, and I think this beer is a good candidate for it, because the added complexity the mashed grains will impart (I hope) will be necessary for offsetting all those IBUs.

Another question...I have some centennial on hand but it's all 8.5 AA. Should I calculate and buy more to hit the IBU target, or not sweat the extra 1.5% on each oz?

Thanks so much everyone...


CB

Baron ken said:

Here's another PM recipe for you (I plan to do it AG next time) (see my recipe in my recipe dropdown for more details). Note that I use BOTH munich and vienna malts:

Recipe Type: Partial Mash
Yeast: Safale US-05
Yeast Starter: no
Additional Yeast or Yeast Starter: no
Batch Size (Gallons): 11
Original Gravity: 1.056
Final Gravity: 1.012
Boiling Time (Minutes): 60
IBU: 49
Color: 4.7 SRM
Primary Fermentation (# of Days & Temp): 3 weeks at 65F
Tasting Notes: Was cloudier than Bell's Two Hearted Ale (edit: but has since cleared up).

My clone of Bell's Two Hearted Ale.

Brewed 8/23/08

12 lbs. Briess Pilsen DME (i.e. extra-light)

1 lb. 2-row
2 lbs. vienna
2 lbs. munich
1 lb. crystal 10L
1 lb. carapils
1 lb. wheat

Partial mash @ 152F for 60 mins.

Centennial: whole leaf @ unknown %AA (assumed 9%)
2 oz. @ 60 min.
1 oz @ 15 min.
1 oz. @ 10 min.
1 oz. @ 5 min.
2 oz. @ 0 min.
2 oz. dry hop in primary

I will leave out the wheat for future brews of this recipe.

I have a glass of this almost every night, quite tasty!

Click to expand...

Too much crystal (I hate when people say that on this forum) but its true. Also too much munich and vienna, this beer has big hops because there is not much balance with the malt.

Iechyd Da - Personally I'd go the opposite direction, Yooperbrew's grain bill and s3n8's hop schedule. I think Two Hearted has a simple and light grain profile and and the bigger late hop additions of s3n8's recipe will give you that big Centennial flavor and aroma you want in Two Hearted.

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I have to agree with Iechyd Da on this.

King of Cascade said:

Baron Ken said:

.
.
Batch Size (Gallons): 11
.
.

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Too much crystal (I hate when people say that on this forum) but its true. Also too much munich and vienna, this beer has big hops because there is not much balance with the malt.

Iechyd Da - Personally I'd go the opposite direction, Yooperbrew's grain bill and s3n8's hop schedule. I think Two Hearted has a simple and light grain profile and and the bigger late hop additions of s3n8's recipe will give you that big Centennial flavor and aroma you want in Two Hearted.

Click to expand...

I have to agree with Iechyd Da on this.

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And yet I use the same amount of Crystal and half as much Vienna as Yooperbrew's posted recipe.

Edit: maybe I should have posted it scaled to 5 gal, sorry.

TexLaw and I were discussing IPAs over dinner last night. One trick to a good IPA is to use vienna and/or munich malt, and a good bit of it, while keeping the crystal malts around ~5% of the grist (see EdWort's Haus IPA recipe). Even 30% vienna isn't too much. Mashing low and slow (149*F for 90 minutes) ensures full attenuation. The darker base malt gives a nice malt flavor that comes through, while it will still have a very dry and hoppy finish thanks to high attenuation. An all-two-row IPA will have only hop flavor and no malt backbone, fine if you just want to build a hop bomb.

For PM or extract replacing 10% of the extract with simple sugar helps dry it out, since there is little control over fermentability of extracts.

That said, rules are meant to be broken. For instance, Widmer's Broken Halo is one of my favorite IPAs, and it uses straight two-row and 15% crystal!

I was thinking of trying a two hearted clone for my second try at brewing. I think I will take the above advice and use the grains from the 2nd recipe and the hop schedule from the 1st recipe. However, the first recipe shows .88 lb of corn sugar listed as the last ingredient.

At which point should the sugar be added to the wort, at the start of the boil?

I add sugar 10 mins from the end of the boil. That minimizes carmelization and ensures time to kill any bad stuff.

What is the purpose of adding the sugar exactly? I'm guessing to raise the alcohol content without having to add more malt?

I love mine. You'll have to convert it to extract but my OG is 1.055

10 lbs Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM) Grain 76.92 %
2 lbs Vienna Malt (3.5 SRM) Grain 15.38 %
8.0 oz Cara-Pils/Dextrine (2.0 SRM) Grain 3.85 %
8.0 oz Caramel/Crystal Malt - 20L (20.0 SRM) Grain 3.85 %
1.00 oz Centennial [9.50 %] (60 min) Hops 30.3 IBU
0.50 oz Centennial [9.50 %] (Dry Hop 5 days) Hops -
1.00 oz Centennial [9.50 %] (15 min) Hops 15.0 IBU
1.00 oz Centennial [9.50 %] (5 min) Hops 6.0 IBU
1.00 oz Centennial [9.50 %] (1 min) Hops 1.3 IBU
1 Pkgs SafAle English Ale (DCL Yeast #S-04) Yeast-Ale

eschatz said:

I love mine. You'll have to convert it to extract but my OG is 1.055

10 lbs Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM) Grain 76.92 %
2 lbs Vienna Malt (3.5 SRM) Grain 15.38 %
8.0 oz Cara-Pils/Dextrine (2.0 SRM) Grain 3.85 %
8.0 oz Caramel/Crystal Malt - 20L (20.0 SRM) Grain 3.85 %
1.00 oz Centennial [9.50 %] (60 min) Hops 30.3 IBU
0.50 oz Centennial [9.50 %] (Dry Hop 5 days) Hops -
1.00 oz Centennial [9.50 %] (15 min) Hops 15.0 IBU
1.00 oz Centennial [9.50 %] (5 min) Hops 6.0 IBU
1.00 oz Centennial [9.50 %] (1 min) Hops 1.3 IBU
1 Pkgs SafAle English Ale (DCL Yeast #S-04) Yeast-Ale

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OOOOH- I'm so making that! Thanks for sharing it!

It is VERY good. It's my favorite IPA that I make. It has a very "wet" hop character. Extremely drinkable and smells like heaven.

bhughes said:

What is the purpose of adding the sugar exactly? I'm guessing to raise the alcohol content without having to add more malt?

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Yes, exactly. It will give a thinner bodied and drier beer than if you used malt.

bhughes said:

What is the purpose of adding the sugar exactly? I'm guessing to raise the alcohol content without having to add more malt?

Click to expand...

Yes, it does raise the alc % a point or so, but it also helps dry the beer out a bit. I do not like syrupy beers, so in an attempt to keep bigger beers from getting too thick and syrupy, I always add a bit of sugar.

I like it, you don't have to add it if its not what you are after.

eschatz said:

I love mine. You'll have to convert it to extract but my OG is 1.055

10 lbs Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM) Grain 76.92 %
2 lbs Vienna Malt (3.5 SRM) Grain 15.38 %
8.0 oz Cara-Pils/Dextrine (2.0 SRM) Grain 3.85 %
8.0 oz Caramel/Crystal Malt - 20L (20.0 SRM) Grain 3.85 %
1.00 oz Centennial [9.50 %] (60 min) Hops 30.3 IBU
0.50 oz Centennial [9.50 %] (Dry Hop 5 days) Hops -
1.00 oz Centennial [9.50 %] (15 min) Hops 15.0 IBU
1.00 oz Centennial [9.50 %] (5 min) Hops 6.0 IBU
1.00 oz Centennial [9.50 %] (1 min) Hops 1.3 IBU
1 Pkgs SafAle English Ale (DCL Yeast #S-04) Yeast-Ale

Click to expand...

That's a good grain bill, and very close to the BYO Two-Hearted clone that I made last month. That recipe had .5 lb crystal 10 and 6 oz crystal 40 instead of the Crystal 20. But I'm guessing the end result is pretty close to the same, and it's a nice one.

I think you're light on the hops for Two-Hearted though. I did a 60/45/30/15/dry schedule, all Centennial, about 67 IBU's.

s3n8 said:

Yes, it does raise the alc % a point or so, but it also helps dry the beer out a bit. I do not like syrupy beers, so in an attempt to keep bigger beers from getting too thick and syrupy, I always add a bit of sugar.

I like it, you don't have to add it if its not what you are after.

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Cool, thanks! I hope I can make a beer that taste at least close to the two hearted ale. It has been my favorite beer for a while now and it seems every IPA or hoppy beer I drink I compare to it and they are just not as good to me. I think I like how it's lighter on the malt flavor but is plenty strong on the hops, compared to something like the hopdevil which is much darker and maltier.

This is my Two Hearted Clone. It's about perfect as far as I can tell.

What if you added some corn sugar near the end of the recipe like mentioned above. Seems like it would help raise the ABV to be closer to the original (7%).