Snake River Pako's IPA?

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hogwash

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Has anyone ever tried to clone this? I had this on a trip to WY a couple years ago and it was wonderful. I'd love to make something close to it. Any ideas?

Their website only mentions "6.8% ABV and 60+ IBUs with explosive hop aroma from a pungent Simcoe/Columbus blend." So I guess I know what the flameout & dry hop additions are.
 
It's a great beer - won gold this year at GABF I think. I recommend emailing the brewery. Friendly folks over there.
 
I stumbled upon this thread in a search for a clone of Pakos. I sent a message to Snake River and I'll let you guys know if I get a response.
 
I've only brewed it once but in my initial recipe I would maybe bump up the Munich and drop the Carastan/Caramel amount to a half pound. It was a little sweeter than I was shooting for, but still a great beer. I think next time I'll try FWH'ing too and I might even go a little heavier on the Columbus than the Simcoe for the late additions. I'm unable to get the beer here unless I want to pay $40 for them to send a 12 pack to me, so I have nothing with which to compare it. Everybody who had it absolutely loved it.
 
I stumbled upon this thread in a search for a clone of Pakos. I sent a message to Snake River and I'll let you guys know if I get a response.

Hey, Did you hear back from them? Just curious to see if they told you anything different than they told me.
 
Yeah, he sent this:

Glad you like the Pako's. I scaled it down to five gallons for you on this recipe. It's only about 60 IBUs most of the hop perception comes from the dry hops. Don't spare the simcoes!

note the kettle hops are in grams and you'll have to interpolate the dry hops at a rate of 1.1 pounds per barrel (31 us gallons)

OG is 15.5 plato which I think is going to roughly be 1062 sg, you better check my math on that.

If you're using extract you'll just need something that will give a light version of that english pale color.

But you can see the grain bill in the recipe.

Happy Brewing!

OG: 1.063
Pale Malt - 8.82 lbs.
Cara Munich 34 - .19 lb.
Munich - .52 lb.

Mash temp: 149*

He said they do a 2 hour boil for Pako's.
Here's the hop schedule:
.48 oz. Columbus - 2 hours
.58 oz. Simcoe - 2 hours
.21 oz. Columbus - 1 hour 45 min.
.25 oz. Simcoe - 1 hour 45 min.
.375 oz. Columbus - 30 min.

Gypsum added at 30 min.

2.75 oz. Simcoe (dry hop)
2.75 oz. Columbus (dry hop)

The recipe didn't specify how long they dry hop for, but I assume 7 days.
 
Wow, thanks! That's a really interesting recipe.

I'm really surprised at all the early hop additions and NO late hop additions. How the heck is it only 60 IBU w/boiling 1.5oz of high alpha hops for 2 hours? And honestly, I just don't think I could bring myself to boil Simcoe for 2 hours.
 
Yeah, I was really confused when I saw that. No flavor or aroma hops besides the dry hops either. I have a feeling that maybe he wasn't telling me everything.
 
Yeah, I was really confused when I saw that. No flavor or aroma hops besides the dry hops either. I have a feeling that maybe he wasn't telling me everything.

Nah, I bet that's their recipe...I doubt he would mislead or withhold info.

Large-volume brewing is somewhat different so it won't scale perfectly. We'd have to adjust the bittering additions to hit the target IBUs.

And a 5oz dry hop will give you plenty of hop character.

I'll have to try this beer again now that I see the recipe. Thanks for posting this, gives me something to think about!
 
Wow, that's way more than they gave me. I can't say I have much interest in doing a 2 hour boil, though. I might take the grain bill and play around with the hops for a one hour boil & see what I come up with.

5.5 oz for dry hopping!
 
Yeah, I bet you could get really close that way:

Same grain bill.
Simcoe & Columbus at same relative proportions at 60 and 30 to hit 60 IBU
Match dry hop.
 
They told me "heavy on the finishing and dry hops" which tells me there's probably a flameout addition as well.
 
He said they do a 2 hour boil for Pako's.
Here's the hop schedule:
.48 oz. Columbus - 2 hours
.58 oz. Simcoe - 2 hours
.21 oz. Columbus - 1 hour 45 min.
.25 oz. Simcoe - 1 hour 45 min.
.375 oz. Columbus - 30 min.

So I've been thinking about this hop schedule and trying to figure out how they get the flavor and aroma they do from frontloading it like this. Then it dawned on me, they must start their timer at 0 at the beginning of the boil. So the .375oz of Columbus goes in at 30 minutes into the boil, then you have 15 min & flameout additions. This makes a lot more sense as I wouldn't think they'd bother with using both hops for the bittering addition AND one of the brewers told me that they go heavy on the finishing hops. Make sense to everyone else?
 
So I've been thinking about this hop schedule and trying to figure out how they get the flavor and aroma they do from frontloading it like this. Then it dawned on me, they must start their timer at 0 at the beginning of the boil. So the .375oz of Columbus goes in at 30 minutes into the boil, then you have 15 min & flameout additions. This makes a lot more sense as I wouldn't think they'd bother with using both hops for the bittering addition AND one of the brewers told me that they go heavy on the finishing hops. Make sense to everyone else?

Now that you say that, yes, it does make sense.
 
I'm also only getting 30ish IBUs in Brewpal from those amounts so they need to be increased. I have a feeling he scaled the batch linearly (is that a word?) and since they do a much larger boil and thus get higher utilization, their hop to volume ratio is lower. <---At least that's my theory, could be he just divided wrong.

Once I get it together, I'll post a revised recipe both here and in my other thread that I linked to earlier.
 
Okay, so here is the recipe I'm planning to use:

6 gallon batch, my pre-boil volume is about 7.5 gallons.

Also, this is for a 1 hour boil, not 2.

12.25# 2 Row 92%
12oz Light Munich 5.6%
5oz Caramunich 2.3%

Mash @ 149* for 1 hour, my standard mash thickness is 1.33qts/lb.

(In the recipe that MrNic got from the brewery, the percentages were 92.5%, 5.5%, & 2%. Note that I'm doing a 6 gallon batch and only a 1 hour boil, so I've got quite a bit more grain in my recipe.)

Hops:
.75 oz Columbus 15.2% - 60 min
1 oz Columbus 15.2% - 15
1 oz Simcoe 13% - 15
1 oz Columbus - flameout
1 oz Simcoe - flameout

2.75 oz each Simcoe & Columbus for dry hop

This gives me 67 IBUs, and I just rounded the 15 minute & flameout additions to 1 oz for ease of use, obviously.

OG should come out to 1.065. Brewpal gives me an FG of 1.014 and ABV of 6.7% using US-05.

I probably won't get around to brewing this until January, I'll try to remember to update with results.
 
I added this recipe in brewers friend and the ibus calculated to 19, that's no where close to 60. What did i do wrong?

Was thinking of bumping up the flame out hops to .75 oz and 15 minute hops to .5 oz, thoughts on that?

Here's the recipe i entered into that site

http://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/recipe/view/29335/pako-s-ipa

I think the amounts that the brewery gave were too low for a homebrewed batch. My theory is that when he, the brewer that emailed MrNic, scaled the batch he just divided everything in their recipe down to a 5 gallon batch, not taking hop utilization into account. I would think that they get much higher utilization in their larger boils than we do in our home breweries. I don't know if I'm right about that but the amounts given definitely need to be bumped up. I would increase everything as in my recipe 1 post above yours.
 
Thank you

So the online recipe is correct, 19 ibu is way weak

The one I came up with is for a one hour boil. You may wish to tweak it some if you want to do a 2 hour boil. I don't think anyone has brewed it yet but I'm planning to do it soon.
 
hogwash said:
The one I came up with is for a one hour boil. You may wish to tweak it some if you want to do a 2 hour boil. I don't think anyone has brewed it yet but I'm planning to do it soon.

Subscribed. Hope to hear how it turns our soon, as it is a pretty awesome beer!
 
Gonna brew this tomorrow. I'll post updates as the beer progresses. I'm going to use a Burton-on-Trent water profile.
 
I brewed this on 1/27 and it's been in primary since. I just took a sample and after just short of 2 weeks this is one tasty beer. The hops are a bit sharp, to be expected, but I'm sure they will mellow with another couple weeks. So far, I'm really impressed with this. I was just a couple points shy of the target OG of 1.065 at 1.063 but hit the FG of 1.014 so I'm at 6.4% ABV. I think I'm going to let it sit for another week in primary, then keg and dry hop. I'll keep updating but I'm going to go ahead and recommend this one.

Oh, the caveat is that it's been a couple years since I've had a Pako's and I live in VA so I can't really speak to how close this is to the original. I just remember the Pako's was really tasty.
 
Thanks for doing the legwork on this guys! I love this beer, especially riverside after catching trout on the fly.
 
Kegged & dry hopped today. That was definitely the most hops I've ever used to dry hop. I'm going to let it sit until next Wednesday then pull the hops bag and put it on the gas to carbonate. Should be ready to drink on Friday, I'll let you know how it tastes.
 
hogwash said:
Kegged & dry hopped today. That was definitely the most hops I've ever used to dry hop. I'm going to let it sit until next Wednesday then pull the hops bag and put it on the gas to carbonate. Should be ready to drink on Friday, I'll let you know how it tastes.

I hope it turns out well. If you are unable to get it, I would be willing to find time to send you a 6'er, as I am in the area. At least that way we could get some tasting notes, see how it compares, and go from there. Maybe arrange a trade?
 
hogwash said:
So I've been thinking about this hop schedule and trying to figure out how they get the flavor and aroma they do from frontloading it like this. Then it dawned on me, they must start their timer at 0 at the beginning of the boil. So the .375oz of Columbus goes in at 30 minutes into the boil, then you have 15 min & flameout additions. This makes a lot more sense as I wouldn't think they'd bother with using both hops for the bittering addition AND one of the brewers told me that they go heavy on the finishing hops. Make sense to everyone else?

Yes, you are correct. I asked for help brewing their Zonker stout and they sent me a whole spreadsheet of info. It included the same 2hr boil and "weird" hop additions, so I asked for clarification. Basically, their notation is the opposite of standard homebrew notation...so, their 30 min addition is 30 minutes INTO a 2 hour boil. Their 2 hour additions are flameout additions.
 
Totally subscribed to this.

Went to snake river brewery last October and hammered some Paco's. It was awesome!

I'm just now getting set up for all grain after bout 2 years of extract and I think I'll make this my first venture into AG.

Thanks and I hope it turns out fantastic!
 
I hope it turns out well. If you are unable to get it, I would be willing to find time to send you a 6'er, as I am in the area. At least that way we could get some tasting notes, see how it compares, and go from there. Maybe arrange a trade?

PM sent
 
I know I'm a little late to the party here but Pako's is effin tasty. Just curious on the final product and if it turned out close to the commercial brew. I can't get my hands on any in southern Utah unfortunately but my recollection of Pako's is that it is a standout! Also, Hogwash is your recipe on the first page of the thread what you put in your keg? Thanks a ton for posting this up. I want to brew this one soon.
 
I know I'm a little late to the party here but Pako's is effin tasty. Just curious on the final product and if it turned out close to the commercial brew. I can't get my hands on any in southern Utah unfortunately but my recollection of Pako's is that it is a standout! Also, Hogwash is your recipe on the first page of the thread what you put in your keg? Thanks a ton for posting this up. I want to brew this one soon.

The one I brewed is the one on page 2 of this thread, post #19.

As you can see in the pic, my brew (on the left) still has a bit of haze to it even though it's been in the keg for 3 weeks now. Though I did pick the keg up last night to see how much was left and stirred up a bit of dry hop gunk too, which you can see in the pic. But mine has a more coppery color to it while the original is more of a golden color.

Aroma-wise, mine has a little fresher hop nose to it while the original seems to have faded somewhat but there is still a close similarity.

Flavor-wise, they are darn close. The homebrew has a bit fresher hop flavor and there's a little something in the finish of the original that is not in the homebrew. I can't quite put my finger on it. I don't think it adds to it though and I could actually do without it. Could be a result of their 2 hour boil with the bittering addition a half hour in? I don't know. I'm no BJCP judge...

But I'd say this is a winner. I dry hopped in the keg and when I do this again, I may use fewer dry hops, say 2 oz. of each. I don't think it really needs the full 5.5 oz. or whatever it was. I also really should have let it sit for a week or two after pulling the dry hops and before putting it on the gas but that's my own kegging inexperience. There was quite a bit of hop gunk floating in it the first couple weeks that it was on tap. It would be interesting to see how a 2 hour boil would affect this. Any takers?

Edit: Mine cleared a good bit as the comparison and this write up went on, it still is a little more on the copper side than the original.

DSCN2137.jpg
 
By the way, I used dark munich instead of the light munich listed in the recipe which probably accounts for the coppery color. Light munich should give you a more golden hue.
 
I'm definitely doing this soon. Just had the home brew shop order in some Simcoe so I'll be ready to go soon.
 
Anyone brew this lately? Recipe looks similar to Gandhi-bot in a way. Lots of Simcoe and Columbus late. Love Pako's wish we got it in Missoula. I have to go to Bozeman to get it.
 
I've been wanting to do this for over a year, but haven't ever got around to it. I should just pull the trigger and do it. Pakos is such an awesome beer.


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew
 
Swing up to Missoula for a weekend and lets brew it. I have a fresh pound of Simcoe and a fresh pound of Columbus :mug:
 
It's a great recipe. I did a version of this in the fall and subbed Apollo for the Columbus and it was fantastic! The grain bill is a great base for hop experimentation. I need to do the original again sometime soon. So many beers to brew, such little time to brew them.
 

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